Twitter has been walking back user controls over ad targeting for years: it ended Do Not Track support back in 2017 while adding advertiser-targeting visibility, and its handling of tracking questions drew an official EU GDPR compliance inquiry in 2018 after a researcher said Twitter refused to explain how it tracked him. A 2019 incident where it inadvertently shared iOS location data with an unnamed ad partner kept the scrutiny alive.
This removal extends that arc: outside the EU, mobile users lose a tool that blocked some data from reaching advertisers, while EU users keep protection because GDPR forces an opt-in model. The pattern proved durable — TikTok later made the same move with the same carve-out, and by late 2022 Twitter itself was reportedly weighing forcing all users to opt in to personalized ads.
First-order effects
Non-EU mobile users immediately lose the ability to prevent certain data from being shared with advertisers, and Twitter's ad business gains default access to that signal.
EU users are unaffected in practice: GDPR obliges Twitter to obtain opt-in consent before sharing their data.
Second-order effects
TikTok adopted the identical structure a year later — removing most users' personalized-ad opt-out while exempting the EU on GDPR grounds — suggesting the two-tier playbook travels between platforms.
Regulators who opened the GDPR inquiry over Twitter's tracking opacity now have a concrete rollback of user controls to examine, raising the odds of further compliance pressure.
Third-order effects
If the pattern holds, meaningful ad-data consent becomes a jurisdictional artifact: GDPR territories get opt-in control while everyone else is defaulted into sharing, making EU law the de facto ceiling on global privacy rather than a floor.
Platforms' incentive to maximize addressable ad inventory points toward opt-in models expanding beyond the EU — as Twitter's own later deliberations suggest — unless other regulators replicate GDPR-style consent requirements.
The trend: Consumer platforms are defaulting users into ad-data sharing everywhere except GDPR jurisdictions, leaving EU consent law as the only enforceable boundary on targeted advertising.
WTF is this? A popover announcing changes to data-sharing settings for @Twitter that shows up at 10:30pm PST? Hella shady. > “These changes, which help Twitter to continue operating as a free service, are reflected in your settings.” /cc @karaswisher https://help.twitter.com/... …
2/2 If you read the page at the “Learn More” prompt, you'd see @Twitter is obeying #UKpoli privacy regulations & allowing Brits to opt out, but the Canadian #DigitalCharter & #privacy rights don't apply cc @JustinTrudeau @NavdeepSBains #InfoSec #CDNpoli https://help.twitter.com/.…
Oh. @Twitter just informed me of “Additional information sharing with business partners” when I went to log-in on the Web interface. Has anyone reported on what's going on here? https://help.twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Twitter will now share your data with Facebook and Google (to target ads - even if you aren't logged in are don't have an account). Data is easily de-anonymized. The EU won't have this (GDPR FTW). What about CA residents (with CCPA) @jack @twitter? 👇https://help.twitter.com/ ... …
Twitter's got a fun new data-sharing update. https://help.twitter.com/... Great time to adjust your personalization settings to ensure you're not sharing more personal data with Twitter's partners than intended: https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
FYI: #Twitter is reducing how much control we have over what data-sharing settings we have access to. Take a quick look at the announcement pop-up below (if you haven't seen it already) and the link they point to under learn more: Source: https://help.twitter.com/... https://twit…