In just over two-and-a-half weeks, Elon Musk has already left his mark on Twitter. That’s not exactly a good thing. Soon as the world’s richest human took the reins, bigoted slurs skyrocketed. There have been wild, possibly short-sighted layoffs, mass exoduses, and — weirdest and most alarming of all — easy-to-create imposter impersonation accounts. (At least some of them were funny.) Throughout it all, Musk has lashed out at his critics, even ones that could do him real harm. Even seemingly smaller moves on his part have led, briefly, to mass chaos.
As per Android Authority, on Monday, November 14, Musk made another of his brash announcements: He was getting rid of microservices. Writing them off as “bloatware,” he claimed only 20% of them are needed to keep Twitter up and running. Alas, the jettisoned microservices also affected the service’s SMS 2FA, the two-factor authentication required to verify a user’s identity after they’ve logged out and need to log back in.
The SMS 2FA system involves Twitter sending a text to a user trying to log back in. Not everyone has two-factor authentication turned on. Those that do, however, and logged out found themselves unable to log back in. Technically SMS 2FA wasn’t broken. It simply wasn’t sending the text required to gain re-entry to one’s account.
Don't log out of Twitter if you have 2FA. The microservice for it has been shut down. You won't be able to log back in. https://t.co/T6AevAFPCp
— Toon Brains 🍉 🔜 LVLUP 2024 (On Break) (@Cartoonbrains) November 14, 2022
The good news is that SMS 2FA appears to have been restored, though it’s still not working for everyone. It’s just another unpredictable, messy day in the Musk era of the planet’s most popular social media service.
(Via Android Authority)