While Twitter users that delete their accounts or their direct messages on the social network might expect that the data is gone for good, a security researcher has discovered a
Twitter is keeping copies of direct messages sent through the social network even years after users delete them, according to security researcher Karan Saini.
Saini, who told TechCrunch that he harbored “concerns” over the long retention of data, found old direct messages for Twitter accounts that were already taken down in an archive acquired through the social network’s website He also revealed a previously undisclosed bug that allows him to use a since-deprecated API to retrieve the direct messages even after they were deleted by both the sender and the recipient.
Twitter’s privacy policy claims that it is possible for users to restore their accounts for 30 days after deactivation, in case the move to cancel was a mistake.
