Twitter is making another huge change to the way DMs work

If you're someone who receives a lot of Twitter direct message spam you're going to like a change that's coming, but it could break the way some people sue the service.

In a change that owner Elon Musk says will happen this week, Twitter will only allow people to send a direct message to someone that doesn't follow them back if they also happen to pay for Twitter Blue. That means that the only way for people to send a direct message to people they don't know will be to pay to be verified on the platform.

Musk says that this change is to make it more difficult for bots to fill people's inboxes with spam. Currently, allowing people to send direct messages with no controls can mean that people receive a lot of spam messages. However, Musk believes that by making it so those spam bots would also need to pay for Twiter Blue, he'll effectively be cutting them off at the knees.

However, some people, like journalists, use Twitter to be able to reach out for comment from sources and this move will stop them from doing that - unless they are followed by that person or are willing to pay for Twitter Blue. The same could be said for people who want to share stories with journalists on Twitter, too.

It remains to be seen whether Musk's plan works or if we will simply see spam bots suddenly sporting blue checkmarks. Time will tell, but it's looking increasingly likely that a Twitter Blue subscription will be required if you want to continue to use Twitter in the same way people have been doing for years.