Impostor accounts with ‘fake news’ were made with the blue check of Twitter

Twitterowned by billionaire Elon Muskhas discontinued its premium service that gives verification a go-ahead to anyone willing to pay $8 a month, after the social media platform was inundated with a wave of verified imposter accounts.

Before Musk’s $44 billion purchase of the company, the application granted the blue go to celebrities and journalists verified by the platform, precisely to avoid identity theft. Now, under the new strategy, anyone can get one as long as they have a phone, a credit card, and $8 a month.

But the new service quickly became rife with impostors, with users spoofing everyone from the Pope Francis to George W. Bush. So too, the pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly & Co he was forced to apologize after an impostor account tweeted that insulin was free.

Even Shares of the drugmaker fell on Wall Street on Friday after being a victim of impersonation. At the end of the trading session, Eli Lilly shares fell more than 4%, a drop that many analysts attributed to the episode experienced on the social network.

Nintendo, Lockheed Martin, and even Tesla and SpaceX, Musk’s companies, were also impersonated, along with the accounts of various professional sports figures.

Twitter now has two categories of blue ticks and they look identical. One includes verified accounts before Musk took over the company; This blue checkmark indicates that “this account is verified because it is notable in government, news, entertainment, or another designated category.” Instead the other indicates that the account is subscribed to Twitter Blue, service only available in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States.

Musk said in recent days that “there are too many corrupt legacy blue ‘check’ marks, so there is no choice but to remove legacy blue in the coming months.”

The current owner of Twitter is trying to monetize the social network with plans that change every day, but seem to be moving towards establishing a internal payment system long-term.

Musk has anticipated some of his plans during a live meeting held this Wednesday in Spaces, focused on advertisers and the future of the platform, which include money transfersfor which the company has already registered with the Financial Crimes Control network, belonging to the office of the United States Department of the Treasury, as reported The New York Times.

Another novelty will be the commitment to video, in order to support the ecosystem of content creators. It would follow the payment wall in which the company is already working, which will allow users unlock audiovisual content in exchange for payment.

In this service, the creators would have control over the price, determining a payment of between one and ten dollars, according to the first information shared by The Washington Post. (YO)