Skip to main content

Twitter reports it’s being throttled, blocked in Belarus

Twitter reported its site was being blocked and throttled in Belarus amid protests and unrest over the results of the recent presidential election.

According to Twitter’s official public policy account, the social media platform has been blocked after the people of Belarus began demonstrating to contest the election results. Incumbent Alexander Lukashenko declared victory with nearly 80% of the vote, but is suspected of ballot stuffing by election watchdogs, who said the election was not fair.

Opposition candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya also declared herself the rightful winner.

Twitter announced the throttling on August 10, the morning after protests rocked the streets. The company has historically supported access to a free internet, especially in cases of political suppression.

We're seeing blocking & throttling of Twitter in #Belarus in reaction to protests contesting the election result. #KeepItOn

Internet shutdowns are hugely harmful. They fundamentally violate basic human rights & the principles of the #OpenInternet.https://t.co/DN3pc4TkWC

— Twitter Public Policy (@Policy) August 10, 2020

Internet shutdowns are hugely harmful. They fundamentally violate basic human rights & the principles of the #OpenInternet,” Twitter said in a statement.

Editors' Recommendations

Zoe Christen Jones
Zoe Christen Jones is a breaking news reporter. She covers news, digital culture, tech, and more. Previously, she was…
Twitter has reportedly suspended signups for Twitter Blue
Twitter Blue menu option on a white screen background which is on a black background.

The start of Elon Musk's tenure as owner of Twitter has not been without its struggles and chaos. And so far, the chaos Twitter currently finds itself in shows no signs of letting up anytime soon.

So it seems fitting that the latest news on the Twitter front is that signups for the microblogging platform's $8-per-month Twitter Blue subscription have reportedly been suspended. On Friday, Forbes reported that new signups for Twitter's newly revamped Blue subscription have apparently been disabled, having "verified that users have not been able to sign up to the service for more than an hour," and also citing that the option to sign up for Blue on the iOS app had disappeared as further proof of the suspension. The Verge also noted that some users may still see the option to subscribe, only to then be met with an error message. One of the editors at Digital Trends said the option to sign up for the service is just missing from his iOS app's menu, noted that it had been like that "since at least 8 p.m. PT last night," and shared the following screenshot:

Read more
Twitter is reportedly working on paid DMs to celebrities
The Twitter app on the Sony XPeria 5 II.

In what appears to be another effort to help Twitter generate revenue at the start of its Elon Musk era, the social media platform is reportedly working on paid Direct Messaging (DM), with a particular emphasis on those paid messages being sent to celebrities.

On Thursday, The New York Times published a report in which it mentioned that -- according to internal documents it saw and "two people with knowledge of the work" -- that Twitter was working on a paid DM feature that would allow users to send messages to celebrities for a fee. The fee structure for this feature apparently hasn't been officially finalized yet, but The Times did note that it could be "as little as a few dollars per direct message."

Read more
Twitter reportedly plans to enable Edit Tweet for everyone this week
A person's hands holding a smartphone as they browse Twitter on it.

Since Elon Musk purchased Twitter, it's not always clear if the social media app is moving in the right direction, but things do appear to be moving swiftly nonetheless. At least that's how it would seem if the latest report about Twitter's Edit Tweet feature proves to be true.

On Wednesday, Bloomberg reported that Twitter apparently has plans to roll out its Edit Tweet feature to all users on Twitter (for free) as early as this week. The Edit Tweet feature allows users to edit a tweet after it has already been published.

Read more