Twister is a decentralized and experimental peer-to-peer microblogging program which uses end-to-end encryption to safeguard communications.

[14] Miguel Freitas, aiming to build a censor-resistant public posting platform,[15] began development of Twister in July 2013 to address free-speech and privacy concerns.

Lucas Leal was hired to create HTML and CSS for the user interface, with Freitas writing the required JavaScript code.

He began to worry about the accessibility of a large quantity of information controlled by a single entity under American jurisdiction.

He built Twister based on privacy-preserving technology due to the risks involved in providing personal information on social networks in light of mass surveillance conducted by the NSA.

The first Twister prototype intended to reproduce the basic characteristics of microblogging platforms, including: Private messages require the addressee to follow the speaker.

Peers' IP addresses are not recorded in the application, but network interception can identify data flow between devices.