Right-wing writer and notorious online 'troll' Milo Yiannopoulos has been permanently banned from Twitter.
Yiannopoulos - who went by the Twitter handle @nero, describing himself as 'the most fabulous supervillain on the internet' - is the tech editor for conservative news outlet Breitbart.
He became well-known for his vocal support of the 'Gamergate' movement, and has also been seen as a figurehead of the so-called 'alt-right' movement.
The writer has become notorious for his contrarian takes on issues such as identity politics. Wired earlier this week referring to him as 'troll king' in a report on his activity at the Republican National Convention.
Yiannopoulos - whose account had more than 330,000 followers - had received temporary bans on a number of other occasions, and also had his 'verified' status removed by Twitter earlier this year.
The permanent banning comes in the wake of the racist abuse and harassment directed at Ghostbusters actress Leslie Jones on Twitter earlier this week.
Yiannopoulos was accussed of encouraging some of the abuse directed towards the actress. He was singled out by Jones herself:
@Nero I'm hearing this guy is a columnist how sad. Is this how he gets his readers thru supporting hate? I'm acting like a victim? Nice job
— Leslie Jones (@Lesdoggg) July 19, 2016
Jones - who has indicated she is leaving Twitter following the harrassment - was later directly contacted by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey after publicly highlighting the abuse campaign.
The whole incident led to a number of Yiannopoulos critics tweeting under the '#BanNero' hashtag, amid accusations that he "started the harassment campaign".
A large part of Twitter's harassment problem would disappear if @nero was banned from the platform #BanNero https://t.co/ewil3ozHNg
— Graham Linehan (@Glinner) July 19, 2016
DEAR JOURNALISTS WRITING ABOUT LESLIE JONES,
Name the man that started the harassment campaign. Hold him accountable.#BanNero
— Ella Dawson (@brosandprose) July 19, 2016
In a statement to Buzzfeed, Twitter said: “People should be able to express diverse opinions and beliefs on Twitter. But no one deserves to be subjected to targeted abuse online, and our rules prohibit inciting or engaging in the targeted abuse or harassment of others.
"Over the past 48 hours in particular, we’ve seen an uptick in the number of accounts violating these policies and have taken enforcement actions against these accounts, ranging from warnings that also require the deletion of Tweets violating our policies to permanent suspension."
Responding to the banning, Yiannopoulos told Breitbart: “Twitter is holding me responsible for the actions of fans and trolls using the special pretzel logic of the left.
“Like all acts of the totalitarian regressive left, this will blow up in their faces, netting me more adoring fans. We’re winning the culture war, and Twitter just shot themselves in the foot.”
