Twitter Makes All Its Shortlinks HTTPS By Default

Twitter Makes All Its Shortlinks HTTPS By Default

 

Techdirt|Mike Masnick

The push to encrypt more and more of the web's traffic will get a nice little boost on October 1st, when Twitter will change its t.co link wrapper/shortner service to go to HTTPS by default:

On October 1 all new links wrapped with Twitter's t.co wrapper will use the https URL scheme. The https scheme helps Twitter securely deliver readers to the intended destination.

We have discussed for years, of course, the value of encrypting more of the web, and especially increasing use of HTTPS-by-default. Kudos to Twitter for making this move and encouraging widespread use of HTTPS to better protect people's surfing. It's worth noting that Twitter is also warning sites that they may see a drop in referrals from Twitter, because browsers drop the referrer from the header when an HTTPS link goes to an HTTP destination -- but it notes that it will be using referrer policy instead, which is good. Most modern browsers support referrer policy, and thus this isn't really that big a deal. However, it's one of the random complaints that some anti-HTTPS campaigners have argued over the years (that the lack of referrer is a big loss under HTTPS).