Twitter Inc said on Friday it had reinstated the “official” badge given to some accounts, days after removing it, while several users reported the new $8 subscription option for the blue verification tick had disappeared.
The move follows an upsurge in fake accounts on the platform after new boss Elon Musk allowed users to pay $8 for the coveted blue tick that was previously reserved for verified accounts of politicians, actors and other major personalities.
Fake accounts of several big brands have popped up with the blue tick, including Musk’s Tesla (TSLA.O) and SpaceX as well as Eli Lilly and Co(LLY.N), Nestle (NESN.S) and Lockheed Martin (LMT.N).
“To combat impersonation, we’ve added an ‘Official’ label to some accounts,” Twitter’s support account, which has the “official” tag, tweeted on Friday. Musk on Wednesday tweeted he had “killed” the new label, just hours after rolling it out.
Meanwhile, a number of users said the option to sign up for Twitter Blue, the $8 subscription service that comes with blue tick verification, had disappeared.
Twitter did not reply to a request for comment on that.
“Checked with Twitter’s API (application programming interface) and the in-app purchase for Twitter Blue Verified is no longer listed for production,” app researcher Jane Manchun Wong said in a tweet.
( Source Reuters)
