Twitter Silently Removes Sign-In To Access Tweets

Micro-blogging platform Twitter has quietly removed restrictions that asked users to sign in on the platform in order to view a tweet. Earlier, the micro-blogging platform was seen asking users to sign in to their Twitter account if they want to view any tweet but that feature has been rolled back because the users were reportedly not liking it.

Twitter owner Elon Musk explained that the restriction was implemented as an emergency measure to prevent data pilfering. Musk tweeted, "Temporary emergency measure. We were getting data pillaged so much that it was degrading service for normal users!."

No official announcement has been made by the company regarding the ability for users to view links without being logged in, nor have they provided any information on the measures taken to prevent scraping.

In July 2023, Elon Musk took steps to address the data scraping issue. He limited the number of tweets that unregistered users could see and imposed rate limits on the number of tweets that could be accessed by Google. He also said that he would be working to develop a new API that would make it easier for legitimate users to access Twitter data while making it more difficult for data scrapers to do so.

What is data scraping?

Twitter's data scraping issue is the practice of using automated software to extract large amounts of data from Twitter's platform without the company's permission. This can have a number of negative consequences, including degrading the performance of Twitter's servers, compromising the privacy of Twitter users and misrepresenting Twitter's data.

Interestingly, Twitter's decision to remove sign-ups before viewing the tweet coincided with the launch of Meta's text-based app called Instagram Threads, which is considered as a rival to Twitter. Instagram Threads is a new app that enables users to share text updates and participate in public discussions. Users can log in using their Instagram accounts, and posts have a character limit of 500. Furthermore, posts can include links, photos, and videos up to 5 minutes long.