MANILA, Philippines – A 4-year-old bug that was just recently patched on Twitter for Android devices may have allowed protected tweets to become publicly seen.

The protected tweets toggle normally allows users to switch a publicly-facing Twitter account into one where only Twitter followers can see and read your tweets.

Twitter said the bug on Android disabled the protected tweet setting if certain conditions were met, such as changing the email address connected to your account. The company did not specify the various ways in which the bug could have been affected aside from the single mention above.

Twitter implied the bug may have gone unnoticed for quite a long while, explaining it may have affected Twitter for Android users between November 3, 2014, and January 14, 2019. The company said it fixed the issue on January 14, and added iOS or web users were not affected by it. 

Twitter also said it “can’t confirm every account that may have been impacted.”

That said, users who may have set their accounts to protected status could have noticed the bug and adjusted their settings to maintain their privacy, all without knowing this was a major issue. – Rappler.com