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Rumor: Twitter drops Direct Message encryption project

Rumor: Twitter drops Direct Message encryption project
Lewis Leong

Lewis Leong

  • Updated:

Twitter has ended its private message encryption project that would have prevented the government from snooping on its users. It’s odd that in a time of increased security and government skepticism, Twitter chooses to give up on privacy.

But at the same time, we have to look at why Twitter might be doing this. For the most part, Twitter is a public form of communication. In the past, Twitter tried to make direct messaging more user friendly, but eventually gave up as it couldn’t compete with messaging apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger.

Sources speaking with The Verge confirm the company has stalled its private message encryption efforts. Twitter declined to comment on the story but The Verge speculates that Twitter is most likely overwhelmed with projects, rather than abandoning its values.

There is evidence to back up this speculation. Historyically, Twitter has fought hard for government transparency. Just last month, Twitter released a transparency report detailing how many data requests it received from the government.

Source: The Verge

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