Twitter has been busy over the past few days, scrambling to get ahead of fallout from Jones' digital mobbing. The company announced earlier on Tuesday that it will open the verification process to the general public, along with the anti-spam and anti-harassment protections the Blue Checkmark enables.

This isn't the first time that Twitter has had to show a prominent alt-right celebrity the door. Last March, Chuck Johnson, who once argued that homosexuality caused a horrendous Amtrak train crash and doxxed two NY Times journalists, was permanently barred from the site. Reddit, too, has recently cracked down on bad behavior in recent months. The site made headlines last August when it shut down and disbanded a number of its most virulent and bigoted groups.

We've reached out to Twitter for comment and will update when we hear back from the company.

Update: Yiannopoulos has responded to his banning in a post at Breitbart. Here is an excerpt: