If you've got a Twitter account that you haven't logged into in a while, you may want to check in on it soon or you could lose it.
Twitter has confirmed that it will soon start deleting inactive accounts. Any account that hasn't been signed into in more than six months will be removed. If you have an account that you want to save from this purge, you'll need to sign into it before December 11th.
"As part of our commitment to serve the public conversation, we're working to clean up inactive accounts to present more accurate, credible information people can trust across Twitter," Twitter told CNET. "Part of this effort is encouraging people to actively log in and use Twitter when they register an account, as stated in our Inactive Accounts Policy."
Twitter is now sending out emails to the accounts that could be up for deletion, so you should know if an account you have is in danger. The deletion will occur over several months, not all at once. If there's an inactive name you have your eye on, you should keep watching it over the coming months, because Twitter isn't saying when these inactive usernames will become available.
We regularly see platforms clean up inactive accounts, and so it's no surprise to see Twitter doing that now. This move could be nice for newer Twitter users because it could help them get a nicer username than something with a bunch of numbers added to the end. Some folks are concerned that this purge could have the negative effect of removing accounts of the deceased, and Twitter confirmed to The Verge that it doesn't have a method of "memorializing" those accounts, saying "We do not currently have a way to memorialize someone’s Twitter account once they have passed on, but the team is thinking about ways to do this."
UPDATE: Twitter now says that it will not be removing any inactive accounts until it creates a new way for people to memorialize accounts of the deceased.