Microsoft has acquired Two Hat, a leading content moderation solution provider offering protection measures for online communities with a vision to build better experiences for everyone.
Globally, growing amounts of harmful content shared online have increased the need for effective and proactive content moderation. For any online community to thrive, content moderation is a critical investment to ensure positive user experiences and maintain engagement over time.
Microsoft and Two Hat share a vision for using advancements in moderation technology to nurture and protect diverse, global online communities.
Financial terms of the acquisition weren’t disclosed. Two Hat employs more than 60 people and has raised more than $9 million in total funding.
This acquisition is an important evolution of the longstanding relationship between Microsoft and Two Hat that will combine innovative technology, research capabilities, highly skilled teams and the most complete cloud infrastructure. This is a deep investment in assisting and serving Two Hat’s existing customers, prospective new customers and multiple product and service experiences at Microsoft.
A company blog post said: “At Microsoft, we believe that gaming should be inclusive and welcoming for everyone. For the past few years, Microsoft and Two Hat have worked together to implement proactive moderation technology into gaming and non-gaming experiences to detect and remove harmful content before it ever reaches members of our communities.
“Working with the diverse and experienced team at Two Hat over the years, it has become clear that we are fully aligned with the core values inspired by the vision of founder, Chris Priebe, to deliver a holistic approach for positive and thriving online communities.”
Two Hat’s technology has helped to make global communities in Xbox, Minecraft and MSN safer for users. This is thanks to its highly configurable technology, which allows the user to decide what they are comfortable with and what they aren’t.
Over the last decade, Two Hat scaled to over a trillion online interactions a year. It created one of the most adaptive, responsive, comprehensive community management solutions available and found ways to combine the best technology with unique insights; resulting in a blend of AI/ML, linguistics, and industry leading community management best practices.
In a statement, Chris Priebe, Founder and Executive Chairman, and Steve Parkis, CEO, Two Hat, said: “We are thrilled to announce that today, Two Hat is joining Microsoft to accelerate and amplify our shared vision to be global catalysts for healthy, safe and inclusive online spaces.
“We have partnered with Xbox and the Microsoft team for several years and share the passion and drive to make meaningful change in the advancement of online civility and citizenship. We are committed to ensuring safety, inclusion and online health & wellness and by joining Microsoft, we can provide the greatest concentration of talent, resources and insight necessary to further this vision.
“This is just the beginning. Thank you to everyone who has believed in us, supported us, driven us, and inspired us. We’re thrilled and excited to begin this next chapter and continue to make the world a better place – one person to person online interaction at a time.”
