Twitter puts down more hurdles for law enforcers wanting to access your tweets

Twitter is making it crystal clear that they don’t want law enforcement to spy on you and your activities on its platform. The social network issued a warning that developers who use its public programming kits or Gnip data for surveillance will get limited access or will be suspended from the service entirely.

Twitter reasons that just because tweets are public, it doesn’t mean these should be harvested. They say their company is devoted to “social justice” and have law enforcement track protesters using public data curbs freedom of expression. Of course, that still won’t stop authorities from using other means to get data but at least this time they can’t gather so much information with just one program.

Twitter adds profile QR codes, like those for Snapchat

Twitter seems to be testing out a new feature we’ve seen on another social network: profile QR codes. Snapchat has done this for user profiles to make it easier to add people. Twitter seems to have taken the same lead but makes it a bit more difficult to use. Android Police’s Corbin Davenport seems to have received the update for this feature but it hasn’t shown up in our own apps just yet.

To find your profile’s QR code, you’ll need to do a bit of digging around. Head to your profile and tap on the overflow menu at the top right, you should see the QR Code option there. You have the option to save the image to your gallery or send it to another app. You can also select the QR scanner button to scan someone else’s code. Doing so will show you their account profile and a follow button. You can also select an image from your local photos to scan.

Twitter might be looking into offers to keep Vine online

Twitter might be willing to keep Vine alive. According to TechCrunch, Twitter is reportedly entertaining possible buyers for the video sharing service. It has supposedly whittled down the candidate pool from over ten to around five serious contenders. Offers are said to be coming in at below US$10 million, which is significantly less than the $30 million Twitter paid for the startup. But a way Twitter could earn from the sale is through sponsored content deals arranged by social marketing startup Niche, which the company bought in 2015, or through Vine-infused ad buys. Twitter announced during an Oct. 27 conference call that it intended to close Vine in the “coming months.” We just have to wait and see what happens.

Twitter tried out ‘muted words’ feature on iOS then pulled it out

Twitter seems to be experimenting a new feature to help curb harassment and bullying on its platform. A number of iOS users spotted a new “muted words” feature that lets you block certain keywords, phrases, and hashtags from showing up. The feature was then pulled. According to a source, it was enabled earlier than it was scheduled to appear but the option will supposedly be available in future iterations of the app. Based on the screenshot above, the feature can be enabled or disabled from the Notifications menu. We just have to wait and see if Twitter does plan to introduce this to a larger audience.

Source: The Next Web