Twitter fixes bug that allowed users to force others to follow them

"We identified and resolved a bug that permitted a user to 'force' other users to follow them," said Twitter after finding out about the glitch on Monday.

Many users ended up having no followers or less than what they had while the company was busy fixing the so-called-bug in its service.

Twitter addressed this issue and re-assured its users quickly via another message that stated, “We're now working to rollback all abuse of the bug that took place. Follower/following numbers are currently at 0; we're aware and this too should shortly be resolved."

Twitter refused to disclose the number of user accounts hit by the bug but said in a statement that the “protected updates did not become public as a result of this bug.”

Technical glitch in Twitter service
This technical glitch in Twitter came to light on Monday morning when news site Mashable published in a report that a Twitter user alerted them via an e-mail that, “[tweet] accept [username]” then the [username] immediately starts following you.”

Many users ended up having no followers or less than what they had while the company was busy fixing the so-called-bug in its service.

When people found out about the bug, many of them forced their favorite Hollywood stars to follow them. Users who ended up having no followers due to the bug went berserk and immediately complained about the glitch to Twitter.

As per market analysts, it was not a surprise that people lost their calm over a technical glitch in a social networking site since it has become a popular medium of connecting with ones friends and family.

"What we really see with social networking is that for any given tool, whether it's Twitter, Facebook or any other site, there is a hard core of very active users who care a lot about any problems, changes, or interruptions. These people are very vocal and opinionated -- passionate, in other words,” said Dan Olds, an analyst at The Gabriel Consulting Group.

About Twitter
Twitter was launched in 2006 by Jack Dorsey and its head office is located in San Bruno, California (US).

Ever since its creation it has went on to gain considerable amount of popularity and has over 100 million users across globe.

Twitter can be described as a “SMS of the Internet” since it allows its users to send and read short messages known as tweets that can be up to 140 characters long.

People have the option to follow anyone they like on the site though it’s not necessary for other party to reciprocate the gesture.