Twitter confirms it intentionally blocked access for third-party apps like Tweetbot, Twitterrific

Access to Twitter was disrupted for third-party apps that use the popular microblogging site’s API last week. Users were unable to access their accounts on third-party Twitter apps such as Tweetbot and Twitterrific. Amid claims from developers that the Elon Musk-owned platform intentionally blocked their apps, Twitter has now released a statement revealing that it deliberately revoked access to third-party apps. In a brief tweet, the official TwitterDev account (@TwitterDev) said on Tuesday that the website was enforcing its “longstanding API rules.”

The Tweeter added that the move could cause some apps to malfunction. The Dev Twitter account, however, did not elaborate on what its long-standing API rules were, or why the site chose to enforce them now.

The tweet, however, came to confirm what third-party developers already suspected – apps like Tweetbot and Twitterrific didn’t lose access to Twitter as a result of a bug, but were instead prevented by the microblogging site. to intentionally use its API. An API is a software interface that allows communication between two or more programs. All of Twitter’s third-party clients use the Twitter API to access the service.

Twitter’s confirmation comes after the developers of Tweetbot decried the platform’s silence on blocked access. Tweetbot co-creator Paul Haddad said in a Mastodon post that he hadn’t received any communication, official or unofficial, from anyone on Twitter. Tweetbot first lost access, along with Twitterrific, and the former briefly resumed work on Sunday when developers swapped its API keys, only to be blocked again.

Haddad, in a Mastodon post, also responded to Twitter’s vague confirmation, saying, “I want to publicly apologize to Twitter for violating their longstanding API rule. ___.”

According to a report earlier this week, Twitter’s internal communication on Slack mentioned that the site deliberately revoked third-party access. As mentioned earlier, Twitter has not yet specified which rules have been broken by popular third-party apps.

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