Following a revelation about the National Security Agency's (NSA) data collection, micro-blogging site Twitter has enabled Perfect Forward Secrecy (PFS) across its mobile site, website and API feeds.
In a report by TechCrunch, it said that Twitter made the move to protect itself against any future cracking of its service's encryption.
The PFS method ensures that all of the past data transported through its network cannot be decrypted should Twitter's encryption keys get cracked in the future, the report said.
With PFS in place, each client and server session generates its own encryption keys. Anyone who tries to collect a bunch of Twitter data can't break one lock and read it all, TechCrunch said.
Twitter's Jacob Hoffman-Andrews told TechCrunch that the PFS type of protection is increasingly important on today's internet.
Earlier this year, ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden leaked the complex and robust system of collection tools that allow NSA and other government agencies to access unencrypted data and collect encrypted traffic for future decryption, the report said.
The NSA top secret documents were published by the Washington Post and have attracted massive public attention since.
TechCrunch, citing an interview with The New York Times, said that Twitter will however encounter a speed hit of 150ms to make the security measure work.
Search-engine giant Google has implemented PFS two years ago, while social media site Facebook reportedly will follow suit, the report said.
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