Elon Musk’s Twitter blue rollout leads to chaos as fake accounts spread

The pay-for-verification system officially launched after Elon Musk took over as Twitter’s new boss, and some users are already abusing it. Fake news spreaders are using this feature to impersonate someone else for $8 per month and have their content algorithmically enhanced without any vetting. It has influenced many people, such as American professional basketball player LeBron James. A fake account is gaining traction that shows James is soliciting a trade from the Lakers. Then there’s the fake Nintendo of America account (with a blue tick) that shows an image of the popular Mario character showing the middle finger.

The following sports transactions and news could be completely messed up with the new verification system

There are already fake LeBron and Aroldis Chapman tweets going on pic.twitter.com/vQgMqws1W0

— June Lee (@joonlee) 9 November 2022

The new Twitter Blue subscription comes with a blue tick almost assigned to celebrities. If a user is scrolling through the feed, the new tick looks exactly the same. The difference comes to the fore when users click on the badge, they’ll know if it’s given to a notable person or paid for it but is a Twitter Blue customer.

Many such accounts have been suspended, but such fake posts have already spread across the platform. And with the massive layoffs, it’s becoming increasingly difficult for Twitter to check accounts at the time of payment or immediately stop the spread of fake news.

Dude with 10 followers pays $8 and starts impersonating right away @Jason,

And thanks to the check out of the blue, he can successfully confuse ppl and defame brother’s name. @Elon MuskThe monster you created is already attacking the townspeople. pic.twitter.com/baXIgXb6ca

— Tony Pierce (@busblog) 9 November 2022

Twitter on Wednesday rolled out an additional feature giving organizations and celebrities a gray “official” label, but it was scrapped a few hours later.

“I just hit it,” Mr Musk tweeted Just hours after the new tag was added to government accounts as well as large companies and major media outlets.

The world’s richest man explained the U-turn, saying, “Please note that Twitter will do a lot of dirty things in the coming months. We’ll keep what works and change what we don’t.”

Mr Musk took control of Twitter after a bitter legal battle. On Tuesday it emerged that it sold $4 billion worth of shares in Tesla to pay for a transaction in which it took billions of dollars in debt.