Elon Musk rolled out a series of rate limits across Twitter in the first few days of July, initially limiting verified users to reading 6,000 posts per day and non-verified users to only 600. These numbers were later raised to 10,000 and 1,000, respectively.
At the time, Musk said the reasoning behind these and other limitations, which cut down Twitter's web presence, was to "address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation."
DON'T MISS: Non-Verified Twitter Users Are About to Lose Access to a Very Popular Feature
And X Corp., the company previously known as Twitter, seems to be working to address that issue. X filed a lawsuit against four groups in Dallas County, Texas July 6, alleging that these four entities engaged in illegal data scraping against Twitter.
According to the suit, the number of automatic sign-up requests from the four defendants -- identified solely by their IP addresses -- indicated that these entities were intent on scraping data from the platform.
"These requests have severely taxed X Corp.’s servers and impaired the use experience for millions of X Corp.’s customers," the suit states. "By unlawfully scaping data, Defendants flagrantly ignore not only X Corp.’s Terms of Service, but also the privacy preferences of Twitter users."
X is seeking damages in an amount to be determined at trial.
More Technology:
- The Company Behind ChatGPT Is Now Facing a Massive Lawsuit
- Twitter Is in Hot Water Again
- Apple Makes a Big New Move With Elon Musk's Twitter
"Several entities tried to scrape every tweet ever made in a short period of time," Musk tweeted. "That is why we had to put rate limits in place."
Several entities tried to scrape every tweet ever made in a short period of time. That is why we had to put rate limits in place.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 13, 2023
Around 200 billion tweets are sent each year, according to InternetLiveStats.
Read the full lawsuit here.
