NEW YORK - Some major advertisers, including Dyson, Mazda, Forbes and PBS Kids, have suspended their marketing campaigns or removed their ads from parts of Twitter because their promotions appeared alongside tweets soliciting child pornography.

Brands ranging from Walt Disney, NBC Universal and Coca-Cola to a children's hospital were among more than 30 advertisers that appeared on the profile pages of Twitter accounts peddling links to the exploitative material, according to a Reuters review of accounts identified in a new research about child sex abuse online from cybersecurity group Ghost Data.

Some of tweets include key words related to "rape" and "teens", and appeared alongside promoted tweets from corporate advertisers, the Reuters review found.

In one example, a promoted tweet for shoe and accessories brand Cole Haan appeared next to a tweet in which a user said they were "trading teen/child" content.

"We're horrified," Mr David Maddocks, brand president at Cole Haan, told Reuters after being notified that the company's ads appeared alongside such tweets. "Either Twitter is going to fix this, or we'll fix it by any means we can, which includes not buying Twitter ads."

In another example, a user tweeted searching for content of "Yung girls ONLY, NO Boys", which was immediately followed by a promoted tweet for Texas-based Scottish Rite Children's Hospital. Scottish Rite did not return multiple requests for comment.

In a statement, Twitter spokesman Celeste Carswell said the company "has zero tolerance for child sexual exploitation" and is investing more resources dedicated to child safety, including hiring for new positions to write policy and implement solutions.

She added that Twitter is working closely with its advertising clients and partners to investigate and take steps to prevent the situation from happening again.

13% of Twitter content is porn

Twitter's challenges in identifying child abuse content were first reported in an investigation by tech news site The Verge in late August. The emerging pushback from advertisers that are critical to Twitter's revenue stream is reported here by Reuters for the first time.

Like all social media platforms, Twitter bans depictions of child sexual exploitation, which are illegal in most countries. But it permits adult content generally and is home to a thriving exchange of pornographic imagery, which comprises about 13 per cent of all content on Twitter, according to an internal company document seen by Reuters.

Twitter declined to comment on the volume of adult content on the platform.

Ghost Data identified the more than 500 accounts that openly shared or requested child sexual abuse material over a 20-day period this month. Twitter failed to remove more than 70 per cent of the accounts during the study period, according to the group, which shared the findings exclusively with Reuters.

Reuters could not independently confirm the accuracy of Ghost Data's finding in full, but reviewed dozens of accounts that remained online and were soliciting materials for "13+" and "young looking nudes".

After Reuters shared a sample of 20 accounts with Twitter last Thursday, the company removed about 300 additional accounts from the network, but more than 100 others still remained on the site the following day, according to Ghost Data and a Reuters review.

Reuters then on Monday shared the full list of more than 500 accounts after it was furnished by Ghost Data, which Twitter reviewed and permanently suspended for violating its rules, said Twitter's Ms Carswell on Tuesday.

In an e-mail to advertisers on Wednesday morning, ahead of the publication of this story, Twitter said it "discovered that ads were running within Profiles that were involved with publicly selling or soliciting child sexual abuse material".

Pushback

Mr Andrea Stroppa, founder of Ghost Data, said the study was an attempt to assess Twitter's ability to remove the material. He said he personally funded the research after receiving a tip about the topic.

Twitter's transparency reports on its website show it suspended more than 1 million accounts last year for child sexual exploitation. It made about 87,000 reports to the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, a government-funded non-profit that facilitates information sharing with law enforcement, according to that organisation's annual report.

"Twitter needs to fix this problem ASAP, and until they do, we are going to cease any further paid activity on Twitter," said a spokesman for Forbes.

"There is no place for this type of content online," a spokesman for carmaker Mazda said in a statement to Reuters, adding that in response, the company is now prohibiting its ads from appearing on Twitter profile pages.

A Disney spokesman called the content "reprehensible", and said they are "doubling-down on our efforts to ensure that the digital platforms on which we advertise, and the media buyers we use, strengthen their efforts to prevent such errors from recurring".

A spokesman for Coca-Cola, which had a promoted tweet appear on an account tracked by the researchers, said it did not condone the material being associated with its brand, and said "any breach of these standards is unacceptable and taken very seriously".

NBC Universal said it has asked Twitter to remove the ads associated with the inappropriate content.

Others too

Twitter is hardly alone in grappling with moderation failures related to child safety online.

Child welfare advocates say the number of known child sexual abuse images has soared from thousands to tens of millions in recent years, as predators have used social networks, including Meta's Facebook and Instagram, to groom victims and exchange explicit images.

For the accounts identified by Ghost Data, nearly all the traders of child sexual abuse material marketed the materials on Twitter, then instructed buyers to reach them on messaging services such as Discord and Telegram in order to complete payment and receive the files, which were stored on cloud storage services like New Zealand-based Mega and US-based Dropbox, according to the group's report.

A Discord spokesman said the company has banned one server and one user for violating its rules against sharing links or content that sexualise children.

Mega said a link referenced in the Ghost Data report was created in early August and soon after deleted by the user, which it declined to identify. It said it permanently closed the user's account two days later.

Dropbox and Telegram said they use a variety of tools to moderate content but did not provide additional detail on how they would respond to the report.

Still, the reaction from advertisers poses a risk to Twitter's business, which earns more than 90 per cent of its revenue by selling digital advertising placements to brands seeking to market products to the service's 237 million daily active users. REUTERS