Twitter under investigation by US FTC

Last week, Google got hit by a federal probe. This week, micro-blogging giant Twitter is reportedly under investigation by the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

According to The Business Insider, the FTC is "actively investigating Twitter and the way it deals with the companies building applications and services for its platform." Additionally, Twitter is expected to soon be uploading a site dedicated to providing "as much information as possible" for developers and partners.

The Business Insider assumes that the two pieces of news are related, and it's hard to argue at this point. It's not that it looks suspicious on Twitter's part, but maybe it's better to be proactive in this regard than wait for a lawsuit, a fine or whatever the FTC might slap down.

At this point, it's unclear as to why the FTC would be looking behind the scenes at Twitter. One of the more likely explanations would probably have something to do with the fact that Twitter has been cracking down on support for third-party client apps for its platform. Twitter has made it known publicly that it wants these third-party apps gone. (Maybe the San Francisco-based company said it more politely, but that's the gist.)

One way that Twitter has gone about this publicly is buying the clients out, such as Tweetie last year and TweetDeck this year. However, there is now speculation that Twitter might be acting more aggressively than we thought. That's possibly where and why the FTC has stepped in.

Via ZDNet US