Elon Musk Announces Twitter Purge Of Inactive Accounts: What Could Go Wrong?

Elon Musk says that old accounts could be removed from the platform soon. In a Tweet, the Twitter owner said that accounts that have been inactive for several years are being purged at the moment, while adding that follower count could see a decline for users.

Musk had first teased this change in November 2022, right after buying the platform. If a Twitter account has been inactive for several years (it's unclear how many, exactly) the account would be deleted by Twitter. This means that more Twitter usernames would be freed up for use by active users.

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What could go wrong?

But as Slash Gear pointed out, it could also shoot up instances of impersonation, especially in the case of famous accounts that are currently inactive. Essentially, we could be looking at another blue tick situation on Twitter.

We¡¯re purging accounts that have had no activity at all for several years, so you will probably see follower count drop

¡ª Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 8, 2023

Another concern is what might happen to memorial accounts that belong to deceased people and have been left up on the platform by their families as a tribute to them. They're already expressing concerns about what might happen to such accounts.

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Also read: Why Apple CEO Tim Cook Once Rejected Elon Musk's Offer To Acquire Tesla

Currently, Twitter doesn't have a section on ways to flag a memorial page, like Facebook does. Instead, inactive accounts have just been allowed to exist. Musk hasn't made anything clear about what constitutes an "active" account yet, and what provisions need to be followed to keep accounts running.

Even then, Musk's Tweets suggest that logging in to an account at least once every 30 days qualifies as "active." At the same time, accounts that aren't actively tweeting could be booted from the platform.

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Also read: After 70% Layoffs, Elon Musk Cuts Twitter Staff's Parental Leave From 20 Weeks To 2 Weeks

Besides these issues, a trove of information on Twitter could be deleted because of removal of inactive accounts on the platform. Perhaps old accounts could be allotted randomised generic usernames instead of deleting them altogether to preserve information? We will not find out anytime soon.

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