My Twitter Account (@walter) just got Suspended!
2012/03/03 12:37
I've just found out my Twitter Account @walter got suspended. I only found out when I visited the website. I received no email from Twitter informing me. If anyone is following me on twitter, was there any unusual activity on my account before it got suspended? I really hope Twitter re-activate my account because I was one of the early adopters on Twitter (I joined in November 2006) and am quite attached to my first-name account. I've always tried to be a good twitter citizen so I'm genuinely curious why Twitter saw fit to suspend my account.
It looks like the programming accounts I use to query the Twitter API at http://sxoop.com/twitter have also been suspended, so that's put a bit of a dent in my day. There's a Hacker News thread if you want to leave a comment.
This is the screen that greets me when I visit twitter now...
I clicked on the Suspended Accounts link. I hadn't received any notification so I contacted support and filled in the form. It's saturday so I'll see how this pans out next week. Right now my best guess is that the account either got hacked and was used for spamming and reported, or it might just be the result of fine-tuning the algorithms in Twitter HQ. Either way, I hope it's just a short-term suspension and that Twitter will restore my carefully curated friends list to what it was prior to the suspension (nothing against Wayne Rooney or Kelly Osborne).
Update: 8:55pm Twitter have reinstated my account. I got this email from someone in Twitter Support...
Hello,
Twitter has automated systems that find and remove multiple automated spam accounts in bulk. Unfortunately, it looks like your account got caught up in one of these spam groups by mistake.
I've restored your account; sorry for the inconvenience.
Please note that it may take an hour or so for your follower and following numbers to return to normal.
Thanks,
That was quick. Given it's the weekend, I didn't expect this to get sorted so soon. Kudos.