Twitter’s planned purge of inactive accounts, which was announced by company owner Elon Musk last week, has sparked concerns among users who fear losing the words and thoughts of deceased loved ones linked to now-inactive accounts. Among those affected is Emily Reed, who lost her younger sister Jessica over 10 years ago, and has since visited her Twitter page to keep her memory alive. A “account suspended” message appeared on Jessica’s profile, implying that she had broken Twitter’s rules. Reed received tens of thousands of reactions to her tweet expressing sadness about the account’s deletion.

The move has sparked an outcry from those who have lost, or fear losing, the tweets and messages associated with now-inactive accounts. Twitter was previously criticized for a similar attempt to purge inactive accounts in 2019, although the platform backed off following widespread backlash. Facebook and Instagram, in contrast, offer users the chance to deactivate or memorialize accounts. The phrase “Remembering” appears next to the name of the individual whose account has been memorialized.

The management of social media mourning has been an issue for Twitter in recent years. In some cases, a group of mourners could find comfort in combing through the departed person’s social media posts. However, the prospect of losing electronic reminders of people can be psychologically distressing and can bring about a sense of mourning again, according to Shira Gabriel, a professor of psychology at University at Buffalo.

It is unclear whether Musk will backtrack on his decision to purge inactive accounts. He bought the company with a promise to weed out junk accounts and bots. While there are good reasons to preserve inactive accounts, such as loss of historical data, skewed metrics and bogus accounts can also affect the platform. Nevertheless, critics argue that deleting inactive accounts is not a one-size-fits-all approach, and that picking and choosing accounts for deactivation could create a tiered system.

According to Twitter’s policy, an account is deemed inactive if it hasn’t been logged into for 30 days. However, users’ ability to download an archive of their own data through the app is limited to the accounts they possess login credentials for. Twitter has vowed to remove inactive accounts from the service, but it is unclear how many accounts would be deleted or if the policy will be applied uniformly.