X adds video, audio calls for everyone: How to turn them off

The feature, which was already available to premium subscribers, is on by default.

DAYTON, Ohio (WDTN) — After rolling the capability out to its Premium subscribers last year, X has made audio and video calling available all users. Unfortunately, even if this is something you don't want, your account by default is set to allow these calls.

X first launched the feature for paying subscribers who use Apple's iOS, The Hill previously reported. Earlier this year, the feature became available to subscribers using Android.

Late last month, X began slowly providing audio and video calling to all other users.

You can now find it in the messaging settings of the app. Enrique Barragan, an X engineer, explained that users can decide if they "want to receive calls from people in their address book, people they follow, verified users only or everyone.” The company also said users can only receive calls from other accounts they have messaged at least once.

Or, if you don't want the feature on at all, you can deactivate it.

There are two ways to access this setting. First, you can click on the envelope icon for direct messages, then click on the gear icon in the upper corner to go into your DM settings. Or, you can find it under the 'privacy and safety' settings under the 'settings and privacy' tab. Then, tap on 'direct messages.'

If you want to do away with them entirely, you can just turn off the 'enable audio and video calling' toggle. You can also leave that toggle on and instead customize who can call you (e.g. 'people you follow') with the checkboxes. You can see the settings options below:

Even if you decide to allow calling, you may want to turn on the 'enhanced call privacy' toggle, which is set to "off" by default. This will force any call sent to or by you to go through the X servers, making both parties' IP invisible. (If both the caller and recipient have left their Enhanced Call Privacy toggles set to off, the call instead goes peer-to-peer, allowing both to see the other's IP.)