Data scraping explained: What is data scraping and why Elon Musk is changing Twitter rules over it?

Source: The post is based on the article “Explained: What is data scraping and why Elon Musk is changing Twitter rules over it?” published in TOI on 5th July 2023

What is the News?

Twitter has implemented temporary reading limits to address issues of Data Scraping and system manipulation.

What is data scraping? 

Data scraping, also known as web scraping, is the automated process of extracting large amounts of data from websites or online sources.

It involves using software tools or programming techniques to gather information from web pages and convert it into a structured format, such as a spreadsheet or a database.

What are the positive implications of Data Scraping?

Data Scraping can be used for various legitimate purposes. Researchers and analysts can scrape data to gather information for market research, trend analysis, or monitoring competitors’ pricing and product information. 

Companies can scrape data to collect customer feedback, reviews, or to generate leads for their sales teams. 

Data scraping can also be used for academic research, data journalism or to create innovative applications and services.

What are the drawbacks of data scraping? 

Firstly, data scraping can be harmful when used for unethical or illegal purposes. For instance, many websites have terms of service or usage agreements that prohibit scraping their data without permission. When scraping violates these terms, it becomes unauthorized access to a website’s data and can lead to legal consequences. 

Secondly, there’s always the threat of copyright infringement as data scraping may involve copying and reproducing copyrighted material without proper authorisation. 

Thirdly, scraping personal data, such as email addresses, phone numbers, or sensitive information, without the consent of individuals can result in privacy violations. It may lead to the misuse of personal data, identity theft, or targeted advertising.

Fourthly, data scraping impacts a website’s performance. Intensive and frequent scraping can put a significant load on the targeted website’s servers leading to decreased performance or even crashing the site. This affects the user experience of legitimate visitors and can be considered a form of denial of service attack.