Twitter's Ban Evasion Policy

Overview

October 2020

Our rules exist to help keep everyone using Twitter safe and ensure they can participate freely in the public conversation. Therefore, we prohibit attempts to circumvent prior enforcement, including through the creation of new accounts.

What is in violation of this policy?

Under this policy we prohibit a range of behaviors:

You can’t circumvent permanent suspensions. If an account has been permanently suspended for severe violations of the Twitter Rules, Twitter reserves the right to also permanently suspend any other account we believe the same account holder or entity may be operating in violation of our earlier suspension, regardless of when the other account was created.

You can’t circumvent a Twitter suspension, enforcement action, or anti-spam challenge. This includes any behavior intended to evade any Twitter remediation, such as creating a new account or repurposing an already-existing account.

You can’t circumvent a Twitter suspension by operating, or having someone else operate on your behalf, an account which represents your identity, persona, brand or business persona for a different purpose.

You can’t allow someone who has been permanently suspended from Twitter to permanently take over or temporarily operate your account.

You can’t imitate a suspended account if the apparent intent is to replace a suspended account. Operating a parody, newsfeed, commentary, and fan account that does not function as a replacement of the suspended account is not in violation of the above, provided that the account follows the applicable requirements outlined in the policy.

What happens if you violate this policy?

The consequences for violating this policy depend on the type and severity of the violation and of the accounts’ previous history of violations.

Circumventing a Twitter enforcement action (such as a permanent suspension) by creating accounts or repurposing existing accounts to replace or mimic a suspended account is a violation of the ban evasion policy; it will result in permanent suspension at first detection.

We may suspend any account that is being operated to circumvent a Twitter enforcement action (such as a temporary account lock). Note that the account owner may in some circumstances be allowed back on Twitter following a successful appeal; however, any account used for the purpose of circumventing Twitter remediation will remain suspended.

Additional resources

If you believe that an account you own has been suspended or otherwise restricted in error, instead of creating a new account, we recommend that you appeal your account suspension by contacting our support team, and/or that you comply with completing required Twitter challenge(s) if applicable.

Learn more about our range of enforcement options and our approach to policy development and enforcement.