No more Twitter posts on your LinkedIn profile

Business social networking site LinkedIn today said in a blog post that its users would no longer be able to sync tweets to their profiles as a result of some policy changes by popular microblogging platform Twitter. The announcement came soon after Twitter announced a slew of stricter guidelines on its own blog. According to the Twitter blog, as a result of increased focus on “providing the core Twitter consumption experience through a consistent set of products and tools”, Twitter will not allow third parties to use its content in a manner that imitates Twitter’s own services.

LinkedIn stated that in line with Twitter’s change in policy, “tweets will no longer be displayed on LinkedIn starting later today”. However, the company said that users would still be able to share updates on Twitter by posting them on LinkedIn by checking a box when they post their updates. LinkedIn assured that there would be “no other changes to your LinkedIn experience”. LinkedIn has allowed users to show a Twitter feed on their LinkedIn profiles since 2009.

Linkedin and Twitter part ways

Twitter’s move comes at a hard time for LinkedIn. The site is currently facing a $5 million class action lawsuit for a security breach wherein the usernames and passwords of account holders were compromised. The plaintiff is a woman named Katie Szpyrka from Illinois in the United States. According to reports, Szpyrka has been a member of LinkedIn since 2010 and claims that LinkedIn "failed to properly safeguard its users’ digitally stored personally identifiable information including e-mail addresses, passwords, and login credentials”. She filed the suit in a United States District Court in a district in Northern California and wants a trial in front of a jury on the grounds of breach of contract and negligence.

The suit also mentions the fact that LinkedIn was hacked with a SQL injection, a method of hacking that has been used for a long time. This attack is done via a website where hackers will eventually get to the database of information. The suit cites National Institute of Standards and Technology checklists as a common tool to avoid such SQL attacks. Furthermore, the suit claims that LinkedIn had not publicized the attacks, which only came to be known when third parties started reporting it. It claims that LinkedIn only later admitted that they weren't handling user data in accordance with the best practices. The suit also claims that the damages are in excess of $5 million. Furthermore, LinkedIn users who share their account passwords with other accounts are recommended to change passwords of their other accounts.

How has this move affected your activity on both Twitter and LinkedIn? Share your thoughts on the issue in the comments section below.