Update: So, I was denied by Twitter. I applied these steps below to the ‘T’ and came back with nothing. Full disclosure so you don’t get a false hope that Twitter will magically give your desired profile name. In the end, Twitter determined there wasn’t enough evidence that @JoshBenson was impersonating me.
Good case, I guess since the kid has never tweeted. But it was worth a shot. And it’s worth a shot for you if you feel like there are ways the person with your desired handle is pretending to be you. Let us know in the comments section below. There are some good discussions happening down there with more on the story. Good luck.
Twitter squatting: steps to take over an inactive account
You just discovered Twitter, albeit, you’re several years behind the times. That’s okay! But now you notice a problem. Maybe your name is Bob Smith or Mary Jones. You find you’re a little disheartened when you go to register for Twitter and choose your full name as your handle but find the account it victim to Twitter squatting. Someone has registered the handle, but isn’t doing a thing with it. It just sits there. Quietly. Empty.
So many of us these days (including myself) have found that we’d love to have our full names as our Twitter handles, but someone else has already registered them. In my case, someone registered the account (@JoshBenson), but he (or she) hasn’t tweeted. Ever. The account just sits in the dark with nothing to offer.
At TweetBrander, we’re are looking into how to gain access to these accounts and put them to good use. Twitter hasn’t done much with their policy over the years even though many though there would be some sort of rule coming down the pike related to inactive accounts. It’s been debated time and time again on the developer’s blog. For now, it’s a waiting game.
But thanks to a post on ReadWriteWeb, there may be some good news regarding Twitter squatting. If you follow a few steps after having a few ducks in a row, you may have some luck. Here are the steps this user got to work for him. However, Twitter has seemed to have tightened their policies on impersonation claims, but it may be worth a shot.
Step 1: Gather Evidence of Impersonation
When this article was originally published, it was easier to liberate an account for a name you controlled, even if there was no clear evidence of impersonation. If it was a blank account that was just squatting on your name, this technique could still work. But Twitter recently began rejecting impersonation claims submitted without documented evidence of actual impersonation. Here’s the message you’ll get from Twitter if you don’t provide hard evidence of impersonation:
So before you file an impersonation claim with Twitter, make sure you have at least some of the following:
- Specific descriptions of content or behavior impersonating you
- A link to a page on your website containing an image owned by you that the impersonating account is using
- A link to one or more tweets in which this account is actively misleading people by claiming to be you
Step 2: Own Website/Email That Matches The Twitter Account
It’s much easier to get a domain name than a trademark, and you need to establish that the name or brand you’re after is indeed yours. You’re going to need a website and email address with the same name to give you a credible claim.
For example, the Twitter handle I wanted was @emotikon, which is the name of my musical projects. I own emotikon.co, so I used an email address from that domain throughout this process.
Step 2.5: If you already have a Twitter account with an alternative name, and you just want to change its name to the one you want, skip step 2.
Step 3: Register A Dummy Twitter Account With That Address
Sign up for a new Twitter account using the email address from step 1. The handle can be anything you want. When Twitter liberates your account, they’re going to merge it over to the dummy account, so you’re saving a step by giving them an existing account to use. I called mine @emotikonTEMP.
Step 4: Report The Account for Impersonation
The form you need is at support.twitter.com/forms/impersonation. Choose the bottom option, “I am being impersonated.” When you click that button, more options will appear. Choose the one that applies.
Once you’ve chosen the right option, a contact form will appear. Fill that out with all the relevant information and be sure to use the email address that clearly establishes your claim to the name. The optional Twitter username is the one from step 1.5 or 2. It says it’s optional, but it will save you a step.
Step 5: Wait A Little While
After you submit, you’ll get an auto-reply right away. Before too long, a human on the Twitter Trust and Safety team will follow up with you if there are any problems with your submission. If everything is in order, after a perfectly reasonable amount of time, you’ll get the glorious email.
After that, the account is yours! When you log in to the account you listed in step 3, it will have the name you’ve been waiting for.
Victory is mine.
— emotikon (@emotikon) December 13, 2011
We have reached out to Twitter for official comment since so many people want to know more on their policy, what’s planned for the future and what options they have now. We’ll follow up when and if we hear back. For now you can always read their Inactive Account Policy on their website to learn more as you plot your attack in figuring out how to get that Twitter handle that you fawn over (and most likely deserve). Good luck.
[via: ReadWriteWeb]
Great article! What a headache these squatted accounts are and I’m blown away that Twitter hasn’t moved forward with this for years.
Cheers
Jonathan: Thanks for the comment. Twitter’s inaction on this topic is ridiculous. There are so many great, inactive Twitter handles that are wasting away by not being used. I understand ‘the early bird gets the worm’ but we feel there should be a way to directly contact the owner and make an offer to buy the handle from them. We’ll see if there’s any action on this. We’ll be watching this one. Thanks again.
I need your opinion…I have pseudo-name that I’ve used in various writings for about 18 years now. TWO PROBLEMS, 1st: the writings were never published so nobody ever hear the name before (my fault, I know)…2nd: I recently decided to open a twitter account with that name only to find out a 14 year old kid beat me to it in 2011. He has not used it since May of 2011, and the only tweets he typed were to some girl he knows in school…maybe like 10 tweets. THAT’S IT. I googled the username, and to my luck, he is the only person out of millions of websites to have that name. I’m really frustrated, because I came up with this name 18 years ago, but because of the lack of internet back then, I have no way to prove I created this pseudo name. Will twitter give me that @handle or am I out of luck? Pissed off man, because some kid has this name and I came up with before he was even born! Not to mention he used it for some dumb ass girl that he hasn’t tweeted to in over two years!
Ah yes, the 14-year-old sneak attack. The sad part is, the kid wins in this deal (for now). As Jonathan alluded to below, Twitter has taken no action on these inactive names and it’s been several years. And there’s no sign they are moving on it. We’ve emailed the company several times and received no response. So your only option now is to try and tweet to the kid and make a deal or try to figure out who he is and track him down online and reach out to him and make him an offer. That, or find a new name for your writing. It sucks, we know. But take a look at what Yahoo is doing – they’re actually re-purposing inactive accounts like Twitter SHOULD be doing. And this paragraph was telling (thanks to Adriana Lee of ReadWrite):
So you can see, nothing has transpired yet. You think you’re frustrated, the kid who has the Twitter handle @JoshBenson hasn’t even tweeted! And it was registered back in 2009. So I’ve been stuck with @JPBenson since. I tried the method above, but sadly, Twitter claimed it wasn’t a case of impersonation despite persistence.
Good luck. Keep us posted on your efforts and thanks for the comment.
hi i tried more than once to take an inactive username acc but i failed..
do u think you may do that for people cause maybe i did somthing wrong i guess?
like could i give u the user name and you’d do these steps?
I need your help. I tried the way you did it. I own a website too and have an email connected to it that I used. I have the legal alias as my name, and the common nickname as the @handle I’m trying to get. I don’t know what to put in the wrapping up part to explain how they’re imperaonating me through having their @handle the same as my website’s domain. Any help would be great. Thanks.
Hi Cameron. Thanks for the comment. If you see from my update above, I was also denied. Twitter has made it extremely difficult to use this process to get your unused Twitter handle. You have to truly prove that someone is impersonating you. As you can see from our comment below, Yahoo is making moves to make inactive account names available. I think it’s only a matter of time before Twitter gets with it. So sadly, all we can do is wait. As for your case, with their account showing 0 tweets, it’s pretty difficult to prove there is any impersonation. Good luck. Keep us posted on your efforts.
Ok, thanks for the advice. I’m going to keep submitting it until they appove and give me the @handle, because I’m going to use it as a professional twitter account. I’ll comment back if/when I get the @handle.
Absolutely, keep us posted! Good luck. We’d love to see you get it.
Also, the account has 0 tweets, 0 followers, and 0 following. So I need to find out how to prove they are impersonating me. Thanks.
Hi. I’ve just tried this but now they’re asking for government proof of I am who I am, Such as a passport. Thing is i dont even have one anymore! Or a driving licence! I’m from the UK and tried to get @conner. I own a domain too, but it’s not got a website with it. What can i do?
Awesome.
Josh, how long was it before Twitter denied your request?
I submitted a ticket 4 days ago, and haven’t gotten any emails from them other than the automatic email confirming the ticket went through. I have the domain and the squatter used our brand name and images (logo, background) without permission.
What do you think about this?
Hey MikeD: Thanks for the comment. It didn’t take too long, but I remember it was several days. Sounds like you have a legit case for nabbing this squatter as he/she is using trademarked material. I’d give it a day or two more and then try to escalate the matter. I’m sure they get bombarded with these requests, but it still blows me away there’s not a better system in place to manage it. Please keep us posted on your progress and good luck.
It took a week or two I believe for them to get back to me. I haven’t checked with them lately on if they’ve changed there policy yet.
[…] [Image Credit | TweetBrander] […]
What if a account has been inactive for years?
Generally doesn’t matter. If you have a good case for impersonation, they may grant the account to you. But if it’s been unused, it will just sit there…unused for years. ):
It is crazy that this has had no movement as far as twitter is concerned. For me my full company name is too long to use as a twitter name and the next obovious choice is used by a company in another country with a similar name and they use it. But I would be happy if I could get the actual abreviation I want which is currently a unused since 2007 with only two post account or if twiiter would just allow slightly larger names so I could use my companies full legal name.
Glad to see somebody else is still keeping at it. I’ve been trying every now and then, but never any luck, and I own the exact .co.uk domain :(
im giving this a shot! wish me luck!!
What is they have a lot of tweets but haven’t tweeted since 2013 or something like that?? Please help!
I followed this guide and got some automated message to scan in my driver’s livense or something. I’m not sure I’m confortable doing that
Hey My Name Is Charlie And I Think For Like 2 Years I Have Tried To Get @CharlieLawrence It’s Annoying Cause I Have For Long Time Tried Everything To Get This Name I Have Made Many Accounts To Get This Handle But Twitter Always Replies With We Can’t Do Anything Or You Need More Proof And I Own The Domain For CharlieLawrence And Like Most Of The Accounts I Hear On This Site There Inactive And Never Tweet And I Think That Twitter Should Fix This Issue Because It’s Going To Make People Not Want To Use There Site And I Want To Also Say I Wouldn’t Be So Mad If Someone Actually Used The Account But When You Find That It Was Only Created So They Could Have The Name I Think Thats Not Right I An Not Gonna Give Up This Is A Issue That Needs To Be Done
Please Do Not Talk Like This Please. It’s very annoying.
[…] A 2014 Twopcharts study found Twitter had almost 430 million inactive users, which at the time totaled nearly half of its 974 million registered users. Some 44 percent of those 430 million had never tweeted at all. Many might just have been abandoned, but lots of currently inactive accounts are likely also spambots and squatted names. […]