Twitter seems to be enforcing a longtime age restriction rule, even when it doesn’t apply anymore.
Twitter users that appear to have have signed up for the site before the age of 13 are finding themselves banned. Twitter said the bans are occurring whether those users provided their birth dates at the time they signed up or later added it to their profiles, Motherboard reported. Among those banned was Canadian journalist Tom Yun.
However, Twitter’s message to banned users reportedly reads, “in order to create a Twitter account, you must be at least 13 years old,” and, “you don’t meet these age requirements.” This message appeared for Yun, who is, of course, above the age of 13.
While Twitter has always required its users to be 13 years old or older, new GDPR rules add further protection for internet users under the age of 13. With the new regulations, Twitter cannot legally keep content that was posted by a user when they were under the age of 13 on its site.
Twitter told to Motherboard that it cannot separate the content posted before or after the user turned 13, leading to account bans for anyone signing up before they were 13.