Twitter begins to throttle links to Threads, Instagram

Twitter slows down links to various websites including Threads, Instagram, Facebook, Substack, The New York Times, etc

Twitter has reportedly began throttling and slowing down traffic to a number of websites and rival social networks. The Washington Post reports that the company is using its t.co link shorter to throttle traffic to Instagram, Facebook, Threads, Substack, the New York Times, and more.

All of the platforms banned from the site promote free speech, a matter billionaire Elon Musk has expressed strong disdain. The t.co link shortener is used to process all links posted on Twitter but has currently been disrupted by the company. The Post reports a five-second delay before the actual URL begins to load.

Read: Close to half of American adults favor TikTok ban, Reuters/Ipsos poll shows

The outbound link issue was first spotted by Hacker news while The Washington Post corroborated the news and confirmed the findings after analysis.

“A person familiar with the Times’ operations said the news organization had seen a drop in traffic from X since the delays began," the report stated.