X Corp. sends cease-and-desist letters to XCancel and Nitter, both services go offline
XCancel and Nitter are receiving C&D letters from XCorp
XCancel and Nitter, two popular privacy tools for browsing X (formerly Twitter) without ads or tracking, have received cease-and-desist letters from X Corp. Both services have been taken offline indefinitely. The operators are seeking legal advice and have stopped development. XCancel had been running for two years, while Nitter had been maintained for seven years.
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.
- delegate
Why have we let X (et al) have total control over the content posted by the users ?
Why do the users agree to the limits imposed by them and let the platform decide who gets to see the content they posted ?
Because they're offering the infrastructure. The tech for such a network is now within reach of many, but these apps are heavily dominated by network effects and that makes it impossible for competing apps to take hold.
This is negative for society.
Firefighters who deal with forest fires, police, governments, rescue services (here in Spain) are all posting their updates on X - because, like the users, they have no choice, because no alternative exists.
People who don't have an account are not getting vital information because the company decided to restrict access to the entire network.
This needs to be regulated somehow. At least for public services and major news outlets - as a tax for the network effect these apps benefit from.
- expedited123
Twitter has gone from relatively open to instagram / facebook level of closedness where I can't even share a video with my friends because it asks them to log in. I had to rely on nitter and xcancel for that... Now that no longer works either
I have one niche that I use twitter for. If it wasn't for that - would have deleted my account long time ago. Things like this push me towards that direction, though.
- pohl
Nitter and Xcancel should just announce that they’re training an LLM. Seems to be a get-out-of-scrape free card these days.
- fnoef
I dont understand how come there are still people who use the garbage website named X/Twitter.
- eddieroger
I'm sure this also ends the Safe Harbor protection they've enjoyed, then, if they're going to be in the business of dictating what content can be seen and where.
- lousken
who cares about c&d? just host it outside of us
- jwilk
Still on front page: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49437283 (nearly 900 comments)
- raffael_de
what I like about xcancel is that it allows me to read but protects me from giving in to the temptation of wasting time by engaging in fruitless discussions. same problem with reddit. funny thing is that my current account just got permanently banned due to ban evasion ... that's fantastic as I can still join and read subs but I cannot post or comment.