Posts claiming that the last digits of an X link reveal what phone you use have gone viral, with one reaching more than 2.1 million views. The claim is partly true.
The code does hint at the device or app a link was copied from, but only the device of the person who copied it. It says nothing about who posted the tweet, and it is not new.
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What The Viral Posts Say
Several users say a link ending in s=46 means iPhone, s=20 means a web browser and s=19 means Android. Another widely shared post gives a different mapping, saying s=20 is iPhone and s=46 is a computer browser.
It also says X "recently" began adding tracking codes to copied links.
What The s= Code Means
The first mapping matches independent checks. A Cybernews investigation found that s=46 appears when a user taps "copy link" in the X app on an iPhone, and s=20 when it is copied on desktop.
Users who reverse-engineered the parameter years ago also reported that s=19 comes from Android mobile devices and s=20 from the web. So the post that makes 46 a computer browser appears to be wrong.
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Is This New?
No. Users were already noticing and discussing the s= tag on Twitter links in 2018. The viral posts have drawn fresh attention to it, not exposed something new.
What About The t= Code?
Many links also carry a t= value, and this is the part that raises more privacy questions. Users report that it is an encoded user ID, according to software engineer Gergely Orosz, which would let X see who viewed a shared link.
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Should You Worry?
The s= code reveals only a broad device type, not your name or location. Anyone who receives your link can see it, but they would learn little. The larger question is what X does with the data. Cybernews says the values may help X track how content spreads.
How To Share A Clean Link
Delete everything after the question mark, and the link still opens the same post. For example, x.com/user/status/12345 works the same as the longer link.
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