--- title: Twitter Users Get Strange Letters and Numbers Notification description: Twitter users are scratching their heads to find weird Twitter notifications containing letters and numbers. canonical: https://time.com/5426205/confusing-twitter-notification/ author: Ashley Hoffman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-10-16T17:24:28.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:55:30.707Z og:title: People Are Freaking Out About These Cryptic Messages og:description: What does it all mean? og:url: https://time.com/5426205/confusing-twitter-notification/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: People Are Freaking Out About These Cryptic Messages twitter:description: What does it all mean? twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # People Are Getting a Bunch of Cryptic Twitter Notifications and They Don't Know What to Do With Themselves by [Ashley Hoffman](https://time.com/author/ashley-hoffman/) ## Ashley Hoffman Oct 16, 2018 5:24 PM UTC by [Ashley Hoffman](https://time.com/author/ashley-hoffman/) ## Ashley Hoffman Oct 16, 2018 5:24 PM UTC On Tuesday, people received some strange-looking push notifications from [Twitter](http://time.com/4799053/donald-trump-covfefe-twitter/) on their phones at around 12:30 p.m. It appears a significant number of users got a few [notifications](http://time.com/5414349/fema-alert/) in a row that all contained a mysterious combination of letters and numbers, followed by a colon and one or more digits. Devoid of any context, Twitter users were quick to question what it all meant. Twitter’s CEO Jack Dorsey has already tweeted that the company is on it, promising in a tweet Tuesday that “We’re seeing this issue too. On it.” > [](https://twitter.com/jack/status/1052238298402287617) So exactly what is this apparent glitch about? Is “2e1f6171d05a409e9531a2b139d69928: 14” an error, or a much more valuable clue? It’s still unclear, but before long, the Twittersphere was full of questions. > [](https://twitter.com/JackPhan/status/1052237795673104384) > [](https://twitter.com/HashtagGriswold/status/1052243031825555456) > [](https://twitter.com/%5Ftrvly/status/1052242962896248832) > [](https://twitter.com/Lovesmusic96/status/1052242961466052608) > [](https://twitter.com/Official%5FJude%5F/status/1052242870776676355) > [](https://twitter.com/jeremyherb/status/1052236189238026240) > [](https://twitter.com/EdKrassen/status/1052236812842725376) > [](https://twitter.com/andysternberg/status/1052237752761241601) > [](https://twitter.com/StylinsonDaily/status/1052237077667074049) Dorsey later explained that this was a code error, that the company fixed. > [](https://twitter.com/TwitterSupport/status/1052260374806851584) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5426205/confusing-twitter-notification/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5426205/confusing-twitter-notification/"},"headline":"People Are Getting a Bunch of Cryptic Twitter Notifications and They Don't Know What to Do With Themselves","datePublished":"2018-10-16T17:24:28.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:55:30.707Z","description":"What does it all mean?","url":"https://time.com/5426205/confusing-twitter-notification/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Tech","viral"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Ashley Hoffman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/ashley-hoffman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5426205/confusing-twitter-notification/","name":"People Are Getting a Bunch of Cryptic Twitter Notifications and They Don't Know What to Do With Themselves"}}]}] ```