Twitter has announced a new procedure to detect and prevent spam and abuse. Twitter users have been victimized by phishing scams spread primarily through links in Direct Messages. Up to now, Twitter’s Trust and Safety team have only been able to detect these scams after malicious links have already been sent out.
Yesterday, Twitter launched a new service to protect users against phishing and other deceitful attacks. By routing all links submitted to Twitter through this new service, it’s possible ro detect, intercept, and prevent the spread of bad links across all of Twitter. Even if a bad link is already sent out in an email notification and somebody clicks on it, the system will keep that user safe.
For the most part, users will not notice this feature because it works behind the scenes, but they may notice links shortened to twt.tl in Direct Messages and email notifications.
(Source: Twitter blog)
