Twitter has initiated legal action against four unnamed entities in Texas for engaging in data scraping, as reported by a local TV station. WFAA, an ABC-affiliated channel, revealed that the automated sign-up requests from these defendants overwhelmed Twitter’s servers, surpassing the limits of what an individual user could generate. The lawsuit was officially filed on July 6 in the District Court of Dallas County, Texas, according to the station’s report. However, the confirmation of the lawsuit’s filing could not be immediately verified by Reuters. When approached for comment, Twitter did not respond outside of regular business hours.
Daily Tweet Limits: Twitter’s Response to Data Scraping
Attributing the implementation of daily tweet limits to data scraping, Twitter’s owner, Elon Musk, has faced widespread criticism since early July. The volume of tweets different tiers of accounts could read each day has been restricted due to the influx of entities attempting to scrape every tweet ever posted within a short timeframe. Musk reaffirmed this reasoning in response to a tweet mentioning the data scraping lawsuit. Although he acknowledged the issue, he did not explicitly confirm or deny the filing of a lawsuit.
Threads App Launch
Shortly before Meta Platforms, led by Mark Zuckerberg, launched its Threads app as a direct competitor to Twitter, Musk introduced the readership cap. This move was made as Threads gained momentum, rapidly amassing over 100 million sign-ups within five days of its release. In a separate development, Twitter has expressed its intention to sue Meta, alleging the hiring of former employees with access to trade secrets and confidential information.
