Parliament could hire social media investigator to spot Twitter trolls threatening MPs after Jo Cox murder
Senior MP has also called on social media giants to do more to stop abuse
PARLIAMENT could appoint a social media investigator in a bid to root out “fanatics” threatening MPs online after Jo Cox was murdered.
A senior MP has contacted Twitter and Facebook calling on the social media giants to do more to protect female MPs online from repeat offenders who are breaking the law.
Lindsay Hoyle, chair of the parliamentary security panel, has suggested hiring a full-time social media expert to detect potentially dangerous online trolls and report them to the police.
He told the : “There is good reason to look at putting a service in place to look at fixation within social media.
“If you have somebody who pursues one MP or many MPs in a nasty, violent way and there are people who are trained to spot this maybe that is something we should be doing.
“Women MPs seem to suffer more from these people who spend their life sitting at their keyboards intimidating people and that is not acceptable.”
The plans come as MPs have been warned to beef up their security and even put an end to open advice surgeries for their constituents.
Many MPs chose to hold their usual advice surgeries on Friday to honour their fallen colleague. But some MPs said they had deployed extra security at their weekly open meetings for members of the public.
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Yesterday it emerged Education Secretary Nicky Morgan is considering installing a panic alarm in her office after mother-of-two Mrs Cox was brutally gunned down in broad daylight last week.
Another MP has claimed a panic button has protected him from a hostile constituent accusing him of being embroiled in a “conspiracy” to kill one of his relatives.
MPs have complained of experiencing more “aggression” from members of the public in recent years with the heated debate on Syrian air strikes sparking a fresh wave of abuse towards members of parliament.
Home Secretary Theresa May is expected to meet with MPs today to hear their security concerns.