X Corp Issues Cease-and-Desist Letters, Shutting Down Nitter and XCancel

On August 24, 2026, X Corp—owned by Elon Musk—served cease-and-desist letters to the open-source project Nitter and to XCancel, a site that relied on Nitter’s infrastructure. The letters demanded a permanent takedown of all Nitter instances and the project’s GitHub repository, with a deadline of 5 p.m. EST on August 25, 2026. After the letters, Nitter displayed a notice that the service was offline and development had stopped “for the time being.” XCancel posted a similar statement indicating it had halted operations “until further notice.”

ForbesX Forces Open-Source Nitter Project Offline With Cease-and-Desist Over Data Scraping — BigGo Finance GizmodoX shuts down seven-year-old Nitter with cease-and-desist letters The Register UK

Nitter is an open-source front-end for X that fetches public posts, strips ads, tracking cookies, and JavaScript, presenting a clean, read-only page without requiring a login. Launched in 2019 on GitHub, it was promoted as a privacy-focused alternative. Because it does not provide a home feed, notifications, or posting capability, it was never a full replacement for X’s native client.

X shuts down seven-year-old Nitter with cease-and-desist letters

The service was popular on forums that prohibit direct X links, with users sharing Nitter or XCancel URLs to bypass those restrictions. Earlier confrontations include a 2024 shutdown of guest-account access on X that temporarily disabled Nitter, and a 2025 relaunch after the project found a workaround. The 2026 letters mark the first time X has pursued legal action rather than technical blocks.

X shuts down seven-year-old Nitter with cease-and-desist letters

• 2019 – Nitter’s GitHub repository created.

Gizmodo

• January 2024 – Maintainer announced an end to the project after X removed the guest-account feature.

The Register UK

• 2025 – Nitter relaunched after finding a method to access posts.

Gizmodo

• August 24, 2026 – X Corp sent cease-and-desist letters to Nitter and XCancel.

Forbes

• August 25, 2026 – Deadline for permanent shutdown.

Gizmodo

• Post-August 25, 2026 – Nitter’s site taken offline; most public instances reported down, with a single instance in Singapore remaining accessible.

Gizmodo

The developer of Nitter, Zedeus, posted on the Nitter website that the service is offline, development has stopped, and legal advice is being sought. XCancel’s homepage notes it received the same cease-and-desist letter on August 24 and has paused operations. X Corp has not provided a public comment.

Forbes

• Nitter operated for seven years (2019-2026).

Gizmodo

• The cease-and-desist cites alleged violations of the Texas Harmful Access by Computer Act and the Lanham Act, asserting that Nitter scraped X data and accessed account and session tokens.

X Forces Open-Source Nitter Project Offline With Cease-and-Desist Over Data Scraping — BigGo Finance

• The GitHub repository remains archived and read-only, with explanatory text added to the README.

X Forces Open-Source Nitter Project Offline With Cease-and-Desist Over Data Scraping — BigGo Finance

The takedown reflects a broader trend among major social platforms to restrict third-party access to public posts. By enforcing legal claims of API circumvention, X Corp aims to channel readers into its official apps, where activity can be tracked and monetized. The move also highlights the tension between privacy-focused open-source tools and platform owners seeking to control data distribution. For users who relied on Nitter to avoid logging into X, the shutdown removes a widely used privacy-preserving alternative.

X shuts down seven-year-old Nitter with cease-and-desist letters