X is bringing back a familiar face to lead its safety efforts: a Twitter veteran.
Michael O’Herlihy, who previously spent nearly four years at the blue bird, has returned to the company as Head of Safety. O’Herlihy announced his return on LinkedIn about a month ago, but X publicly acknowledged the appointment today.
O’Herlihy previously served as Twitter’s Senior Director of User Services and later Director of Product Management, departing in October 2023. Most recently, he worked at Reddit as a Safety Architect.
Why This Matters
The appointment comes as X continues working to strengthen its advertising business, with an increasingly clear focus on performance marketing.
Last week, for example, X expanded its Lead Gen Ads product globally. The rollout follows a steady drumbeat of tools to help smaller buyers create ads and analyze campaigns.
But winning back larger enterprise advertisers presents a different challenge. Brand suitability/safety, content moderation and trust remain important considerations for major brands deciding how much to spend on the platform.
X itself is making that connection. In its announcement, the company explicitly said O’Herlihy would help keep “people and brands safe” and pointed to his upcoming appearance at its Brand & AI Safety Summit, where he’ll discuss safety and “advertiser confidence.”
Experts React
In his LinkedIn announcement, O’Herlihy outlined a broad mandate covering both platform safety and AI safety.
“The work spans platform safety and AI safety: protecting users, enforcing rules consistently, and building trust through transparency.”
He also emphasized working with partners who are committed to improving safety across the platform.
Our Take
X seems to be pursuing two different ad opportunities simultaneously.
On one side, it’s building out performance products that appeal to smaller advertisers, with an emphasis on AI self-service tools and measurable results. On the other, it still needs to convince major brands that X is a safe, reliable place to invest their ad dollars.
O’Herlihy’s return is interesting in that context. His institutional knowledge will likely prove valuable as X works to strengthen its relationships with the latter.
