Twitter threatens to sue Meta for 'misappropriation' of 'trade secrets' over Thread app: report

Elon Musk's Twitter has reportedly threatened to sue Meta over its new Threads app, claiming the social media rival used Twitter's trade secrets to create the app.

In a Wednesday letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg obtained by Semafor, a lawyer for Twitter said that company "has serious concerns that Meta Platforms (Meta) has engaged in systematic, willful and unlawful misappropriation of Twitter's trade secrets and other intellectual property."
 

The letter stated that Meta has hired "dozens of former Twitter employees" over the past year, adding that"Twitter knows that these employees previously worked at Twitter; that these employees had and continue to have access to Twitter’s trade secrets and other highly confidential information; that these employees owe ongoing obligations to Twitter; and that many of these employees have improperly retained Twitter documents and electronic devices."

"With that knowledge, Meta deliberately assigned these employees to develop, in a matter of months, Meta’s copycat "Threads" app with the specific intent that they use Twitter’s trade secrets and other intellectual property in order to accelerate the development of Meta’s competing app, in violation of both state and federal law as well as those employees ongoing obligations to Twitter."

Meta just released Threads, an alternative to Elon Musk's Twitter, on Wednesday evening, opening with mixed reviews, including some users complaining that the algorithmic feed is not for them, per Mashable.

But the fine print of the new app suggests that it can only be deleted if the user decides to delete their entire Instagram profile. 

It appears that it's not possible to temporarily download the app and delete it if the user doesn't like it. Threads' supplemental privacy policy reads: "You may deactivate your Threads profile at any time, but your Threads profile can only be deleted by deleting your Instagram account."

Twitter user Emily Hughes tweeted: "I deactivated my threads account already but it turns out you can’t delete your threads account *without also deleting your Instagram account* so maybe just don’t sign up!"

Another Twitter user posted: "Definitely not interested in threads. I’m wary of any profile that makes you link regardless. But seems you can only delete threads if you are prepared to lose your instagram account."

 

While deactivating Threads does mean that users won't be able to see a user's content, all the content from the deactivated profile will still reside on the app's servers, according to the report. Posts will only be deleted from these servers if the user deletes each of the Thread posts individually.

Furthermore, Threads won't allow a user to change their username unless they do so on Instagram as well. The report noted that this might be okay if a user applies the same tone across platforms, but it could be a problem if a user wanted to use Threads professionally while keeping Instagram a more personal affair.

Twitter user Konibajecutie tweeted: "My issue with threads is how you can't change your username without changing your Instagram username. Why? I don't want everybody knowing my government name."

Mashable reported that "part of the appeal of having different social media accounts is that they enable us to curate various online personas that cater to different facets of ourselves."

Head of Instagram Adam Mosseri wrote in a Threads post, "I’ve been getting some questions about deleting your account. To clarify, you can deactivate your Threads account, which hides your Threads profile and content, you can set your profile to private, and you can delete individual threads posts - all without deleting your Instagram account. Threads is powered by Instagram, so right now it’s just one account, but we’re looking into a way to delete your Threads account separately."