Twitter Rules Simplified: This is Why Your Account Might Be Suspended Today

Twitter has been out on a mission, hunting for accounts that violate its rules and suspending them, with some being permanently suspended.

It has now suspended over 70 million accounts since the start of the #TwitterPurge or #TweetCleanUp as most Kenyans call it.

In Kenya, thousands of Twitter accounts have been suspended with a majority of them losing up to 600,000 followers.

Many twitter enthusiasts have been discouraged, with some even falling sick, given the amount of time and money they had put in building their twitter accounts.

Those whose Twitter accounts haven’t been suspended are living in fear, sleeping and praying that they will wake up and find their accounts ‘alive and kicking.’

People are now all over the internet trying to look for exact reasons that might lead to the suspension of their Twitter accounts.

Here are the obvious reasons why your Twitter account might be suspended today:

Follow Train

This is common among Twitter users, Kenyans included. You may have probably heard or seen of “Follow everyone who retweets and likes this tweet,’ and now, if you have that ‘habit’, your account is as good as suspended.

Mass following and mass unfollowing is against Twitter rules and the moment they ‘notice any unusual activity,’ your account will be suspended. Do you want to grow your twitter account? Do it ‘naturally’. Let those who want to follow you do and let those who don’t be.

Copyrights Infringements

There are people who are used to ‘stealing other people’s tweets’, post other materials such as music, images or any other content created by someone else without their consent.

When you ‘steal a tweet’ and the owner proves to twitter that he or she is the rightful owner of the tweet, your account will be suspended.

What Twitter is trying to do is to encourage organic, original and content creation among users.

Graphic Content

There are people who are used to posting images that are explicit such as dead bodies, dead animals, an accident, an injury, violence or even porn although there is an exception, in some cases, your account might be suspended.

To be on the safe side, mark your content as ‘sensitive material’ so that the user himself/herself can choose whether or not to view it.

Using Twitter Badges without Authorizations

There are people who have ‘appointed’ themselves as ‘guides on how to have a perfect twitter account’ and they use twitter badges without authorization from Twitter. You are not allowed to use twitter logos without being authorized by twitter because according to Twitter, you might give the impression that you work for or on their behalf.

Selling Twitter Accounts

There are people who create Twitter accounts with an intention of selling them. Well, you are a candidate for suspension.

Inactive for 6 Months

Your twitter account must be active and if you leave it inactive for more than 6 months now, it will be suspended.

Others things that might earn you an automatic suspension include:

• Stolen identity, impersonation
• Violence
• Suicide or self-harm
• Child sexual exploitation
• Abuse and hateful conduct
• Sharing private information of someone else
• Spam and security