Sheer chaos has surrounded Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter over the last few weeks. More than half of Twitter’s employees have been fired or have resigned. The verification system no longer means much. And some users have reported problems with security features. So if you have an account on the social network, what do you do?
Unfortunately, there is no simple answer. But this continuing spectacle presents an opportunity for us to learn how to have healthier relationships with social platforms so we are not dependent on any one of them.
First, it is important to understand what is happening at Twitter. Threat experts told me they were concerned that the turmoil at Twitter, including the sudden lack of cybersecurity leaders and many community moderators, would cause parts of the site to stop working and, at worst, that security holes might lead to compromised accounts. But deactivating a Twitter account also poses risks because an impersonator could then more easily manipulate a person’s followers.