You Can Now Receive Direct Messages on Twitter From Anyone…and how to turn it off.

Direct Messages…aren’t they great.  A nice way to talk behind the scenes with people, send a ‘head’s up’, share a laugh not meant for the public or just to say, “Hi.”

There’s no limit to the proper use of DMs.  Keeping in mind, don’t say anything privately that you aren’t willing to have seen publicly.

But, with the good sometimes comes the bad.  Direct Messages are a great delivery tool for phishing, spam and other forms of garbage. Up until recently the only way you could receive a direct message was from someone who you were following and you could only send a Direct Message to someone who was following you.

Not anymore.

Twitter has just launched a new tool that allows anyone to send you a DM unless you turn the feature off.  The default for this for existing accounts appears to be off, but it’s a great idea to check to make sure.

This isn’t presently available to everyone, but check anyways.  Here’s how.

Log into your Twitter Account, click on the “gear” to open the drop down and click on settings (Image 1)

Open the settings and make sure you are on your Account Settings (Image 2)

Scroll down to the “Messages” and make sure the box is empty (Image 3)

I’m not a fan of this idea at all, but some may be so choose which ever you want.  As a parent, I would recommend that this feature is turned off…the same goes for my wife’s account and any other females.

Could this all be part of Twitter’s IPO and the need to be able to have custom ads sent directly to potential consumers?  Another reason you might want to shut off this new feature, unless you want to get ads.