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X sends cease-and-desist to open source project Nitter over alleged scraping

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Nitter, an open source project that allowed people to read X posts without logging into or even opening the X app, has received cease-and-desist letters from X demanding that it shut down. The news was shared via a brief message posted to the project’s website, and follows X’s earlier attempts to knock Nitter offline by technical means.

The service also powers a number of other sites, including XCancel, that allow people to view X posts directly.

This isn’t X’s first attempt to shut down Nitter. In 2024, Nitter’s flagship instance, Nitter.net, went dark temporarily after X rolled out new API restrictions. Nitter worked by fetching public X posts and then stripping out the ads, tracking cookies, and JavaScript, giving people a clean, clutter-free way to read posts without an account or the app.

After that crackdown, those who wanted to host a Nitter instance had to connect it to a real X account, according to the project’s GitHub page. Despite the restrictions, development picked back up and Nitter instances came back online.

This time, X is working to shut down Nitter and its instances via legal means. Nitter’s website states that the Nitter.net project is offline while its creator seeks legal advice after receiving a cease-and-desist letter. That creator, a developer who goes by the handle Zedeus, told TechCrunch by email that other Nitter instances received similar letters.

On Nitter’s website, the message currently reads:

On 24 August 2026 cease and desist letters have been sent by X Corp. demanding a permanent takedown of Nitter instances and the project’s repository.

nitter.net is offline and development has stopped for the time being. I’m seeking legal advice and won’t be commenting further on the specifics for now.

Thank you to everyone who used, hosted, packaged, donated and contributed to Nitter over the past seven years.

The letter from X, which TechCrunch has viewed, accuses Nitter of an “unlawful use and circumvention of X’s Application Programming Interface (API) and associated data,” through its service, saying that X has evidence that Nitter scraped X data and accessed X accounts and session tokens in violation of X’s rules.

Lawyers for X said the actions are in violation of “various state and federal laws, including, but not limited to, the Texas Harmful Access by Computer Act (§ 143.001 and § 33.02) and the Lanham Act (15 U.S.C. §§ 1114, 1125).” The letter gave Nitter until 5 p.m. EST on August 25 to shut down.

X is hardly alone in policing alleged scrapers. Meta has taken numerous scrapers to court, and most larger social networks today restrict the use of third-party readers, forcing users to log in and access the site’s content through the official app, where they can be tracked and shown personalized ads.

It’s an unfortunate development for lurkers, given that Nitter and its instances offered a handy way to keep up with certain people’s posts on X without an account. Now those people will either need to give up that access or, as X likely hopes, create an account and log in.

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Moove exits Nigerian Market

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Moove, a global mobility company, on Thursday announced that it will conclude its operations in Nigeria, six years after the company was founded in Lagos.

“The company does so with deep gratitude to the customers, team members, partners and communities who gave Moove its start,” a statement said Thursday.

Moove was founded in 2020 by Ladi Delano and Jide Odunsi after they saw that many gig workers in Nigeria wanted to earn through mobility but could not access the vehicle financing they needed.

The company began with 76 vehicles in Lagos and developed its Rental & Drive-to-Own model to give mobility entrepreneurs access to new vehicles and a pathway to ownership.

What Moove built in Lagos became the foundation for a business that today operates 42,000 vehicles across 29 cities globally.

Since its inception, Moove has served more than 9,000 customers across both its Drive-to-Own and rental products, helping customers generate approximately ₦57 billion in revenue, supporting livelihoods, families and businesses across Nigeria.

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As Moove concludes its Nigerian operations, the company said eligible vehicles with an estimated total value of approximately ₦35 billion will pass into full ownership of the customers who currently operate them, with no payment to Moove required for the vehicles themselves from 1 October 2026.

Moove will also reward all staff members with a free car as a sign of appreciation, the statement said.

The ‘Thank You Nigeria’ initiative is Moove’s way of recognising the customers, employees and wider community whose trust, skill and support shaped the company from its earliest days, it added.

Ladi Delano, Co-Founder, Co-CEO and Advisory Board Chairman of Moove, said:
“Nigeria is where Moove began, and everything we have built since carries something of Lagos with it. Jide and I started the company because talented, hardworking mobility entrepreneurs wanted the opportunity to earn, but could not get access to the vehicles and finance they needed. Our first customers trusted us when Moove was still an idea, and that trust made everything that followed possible and for that we “thank you”.

“More than 9,000 customers have used our Drive-to-Own and rental products in Nigeria.
Their work generated approximately ₦57 billion in revenue through Moove-financed
vehicles. Those numbers matter because they represent people earning, supporting their families and building their own futures.

“This is an emotional moment for us. Nigeria gave Moove its beginning, its first customers and many of the people who built the foundations of our company.”

READ ALSO: Moove secures $100 million in series B funding

The cofounder explained that eligible vehicles worth approximately N35 billion will pass into full ownership of the customers who operate them, with no further payment to Moove required for the vehicles themselves.

“To our Nigerian team, thank you. Your commitment, resourcefulness and belief in the mission carried Moove through its earliest and most important years. You turned an idea that began in Lagos into a company that now operates across 29 cities globally. Jide and I will always be grateful for what you have built and for the way you have represented Moove,”he said.

“To our customers, thank you for partnering with us and realising our collective ambitions. To our partners, regulators and the wider community, thank you for supporting a young Nigerian company and helping it grow into a global business.

“Nigeria will always be where Moove started. As we continue to grow internationally, we will do everything we can to make Nigeria proud and to build a lasting global success story that never forgets where it began. Wherever Moove goes next, our story will always start in Lagos.”

Moove will work directly with affected customers and employees as it concludes its Nigerian operations and completes the transfer of eligible vehicles.


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A startup founder who served time in prison is looking to court an untapped market: ex-cons

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Richard Bronson, an entrepreneur who recently launched a startup called Commissary Club, has an unusual background for a founder: in a previous life, he spent time in prison.

In the 1980s, Bronson worked for the notorious Stratton Oakmont — the corruption-riddled brokerage firm that was run by Jordan Belfort, the so-called “Wolf of Wall Street” whose story became a 2013 film. The firm collapsed in the mid-1990s under the weight of misconduct accusations.

Bronson was a partner at Stratton, but left after a year to start his own firm in South Florida. He was quite successful in that venture, until he wasn’t.

“I built a $100 million business taking these small cap companies public,” Bronson told TechCrunch. “Some of the success, however, came through breaking the law — securities laws — and ultimately, as I knew inevitably would happen, I had to pay the price. I lost everything, and most significantly, my freedom. And I was sent to federal prison for a couple of years.”

Bronson has been out of prison for a long time now, but he has never forgotten the struggles he had when he initially emerged from prison.

“Nobody would hire me, despite all of my education and work experience and everything else. I was like completely radioactive,” he said.

Bronson’s experience after prison helped inform his current startup, an employment-focused social media platform called Commissary Club, which takes its name from the store inside a prison where inmates buy snacks and toiletries. The site is specifically marketed to ex-cons, and uses AI to help them navigate the often confusing process of finding employment and housing after they reenter the world.

“I could not help but notice how little assistance was available to people coming out of prison,” said Bronson. “If it was this bad for me, what about the guys I was in prison with who had very little education and very little job experience? What were their chances?”

Commissary Club also has a social component, which Bronson said he added because he knows how isolating the post-prison experience can be. “It’s almost like Facebook,” he said, “where people can not only find job, and get the help with the jobs and the housing and access to benefits, but they find the other missing ingredient that’s existentially important to them that isn’t satisfied elsewhere. They find community.” Judging by the site, Commissary Club also appears primed to become a referral network, and it offers a way for users to find dates.

For now, Bronson’s startup is a team of two — just him and his co-founder, Roman Kissin, who Bronson called the technical mind (or “the brains”) behind the project. Kissin previously worked for eBay and IBM and, between 2022 and 2025, served as the CTO of LexisNexis, according to his LinkedIn profile.

The site is free at first, then switches to paid. Users get “the first 10 applications for free, and then we bundle the next at $149 for 10 applications, or $14.99 each,” Bronson told TechCrunch. Some may balk at that for-profit model, and for people just out of prison, it may be a tough sell.

Yet Bronson sees it as a win-win — a business that can help a community that few others are trying to help.

“People immediately assume, ‘Oh, is this a nonprofit?’ And the answer is no,” said Bronson. There’s a strong mission component, certainly,” he continued,” and I have devoted my life, when I came out of prison, to helping my brothers and sisters with records. Part of it is because I just felt so remorseful for the shit that I had done. I still wake up every day regretting choices I made.

“But we’re going after a huge, huge market that nobody — I mean nobody — does anything about,” said Bronson. “People talk about AI taking away employment and people losing jobs. I look at it differently. We’re building AI that creates employment for people that society left behind.”

Bronson’s Commissary Club was selected for this year’s TechCrunch Startup Battlefield 200, as part of TechCrunch’s storied Battlefield Competition; come join us next week in San Francisco to see the competition live.

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