Blue checks on X deceiving users into engaging with harmful material, EU says
irishtimes.com
irishtimes.com
In particular, this is the complaint relating to "verified" status:
> Since anyone can subscribe to obtain such a “verified” status, it negatively affects users' ability to make free and informed decisions about the authenticity of the accounts and the content they interact with. There is evidence of motivated malicious actors abusing the “verified account” to deceive users.
I actually think there is some merit to this. Verified used to mean what it sounds like: the identity was verified to match the account. The verification process seems a lot more lax post-Elon. I'm fine with that, but then they shouldn't call it "verified".
This was a dumpster fire of Twitter's own doing. It was clearly what irked Elon - and why he sought to rob the "checkmarks" of their status symbol by commoditizing it, rather than coming up with some new symbol for paying customers.
This was childish, but so is the EU decision here. I doubt there's any real confusion about what the checkmarks mean today, and I don't like the idea that just because they were used in a particular way before, a private platform is forever bound by that.
100% agreed. I was no fan of the old system. But regardless of the arbitrary criteria for being eligible for verification, at least they did attempt to verify that the account matched the identity of its operator at the point in time that it was verified. There were stores of verified accounts falling into the wrong hands, but AFAIK there weren't cases of twitter incorrectly verifying an account belonging to someone else.
> I don't like the idea that just because they were used in a particular way before, a private platform is forever bound by that.
I'm not just talking about inertia, they literally use the copy "this account is verified" on my profile, today, when they have done nothing to verify my identity. There are levels of subjectivity over what is considered "verified", but to me it implies at least some basic attempt at identity verification.
Knowing this, if you meet a person wearing a "doe_eyes' bicycle rider" hat, is your first thought "oh hey, that person owns a bicycle"?
If not, then I think it's a bit facetious to argue that the definition is technically true. If you combine a trivial criteria with a nearly-insurmountable one, the nearly-insurmountable one prevails.
The core problem they wanted to solve was "if a user encounters an account that calls itself 'JustinBieber' how can the user determine whether or not they got the real Justin Bieber, i.e. the singer, or just some other random account". So what the badge in effect was supposed to communicate was "The person behind this account really is who you think it is".
It's easy to see that this entire concept falls apart for anyone who isn't a global celebrity: What does "the real Justin Bieber" even mean? Would another, not famous person that happens to also be named "Justin Bieber" not be "real"? What about account names that don't even match a celebrity but where their fans "just know" who is meant? What does "real" mean for the account of a fictional character? Or for a random nondescript username? etc.
Twitter management effectively saw all those contradictions and said "we don't care", as long as their prime usecase of keeping celebrities on the platform was served.
Why do paying customers need any public symbol?
In other words, why not get rid of blue checkmarks altogether, create a subscriber system with benefits, and... that's all?
It seems to me that the only reason to reuse the blue checkmarks and publicly award them to subscribers is to entice people to pay to get some of the previous cachet of the blue checkmarks. Otherwise, what's the point? It's inherently misleading, and that's the point, the goal of the new system.
Remember when Musk forced the blue checkmarks back on non-paying celebrities, whether they wanted the blue checkmarks or not? It's difficult to interpret that as other than a ploy to restore some prestige to the checkmarks and mislead Twitter readers about who has paid for them and who has not.
I don't know, but they do? It's a keepsake of sorts, and it drives adoption if you see that the people you respect are paying for the platform. Almost every platform with optional subscriptions does that - LinkedIn, Reddit, etc.
As for the rest of your comment, I don't understand why you want me to defend Elon. As noted, I think this was childish. But I don't think it deserves regulatory intervention of any sort.
Indeed. Apparently the name has been changed now to "Premium", but originally it was "Twitter Blue". The blue checkmark was the selling point.
> Almost every platform with optional subscriptions does that - LinkedIn, Reddit, etc.
TIL there's a Reddit Premium symbol in user profiles. However, the Reddit Premium symbol is not displayed in posts and comments, which makes it very different from Twitter's system.
> I don't understand why you want me to defend Elon.
I don't. That would be entirely your choice.
There's no law that says a blue check next to a name comes with any kind of guarantee. Unless X has language somewhere about what "verified" actually connotes beyond the simplest interpretation of the word, I don't see what the action is here.
The fact that cryptoscams and other such people are using blue-checkmarks to trick others today on Twitter is proof of the dark pattern. What is the point of a "verification" system that lets scammers in? Obviously the scammers find the $8/month blue checkmark to be worthy enough to spend.
There was that one Russian Bot account people were making fun of that ran out of ChatGPT tokens with a blue checkmark as well. So you're getting bots and scammers in on the "verified" mark (and Twitter is literally profiting from them by taking their money).
I think that's worthy to call attention in some countries. EU doesn't like this kind of stuff for example. So I'm not surprised to see EU action on this situation alone.
That already has happened way before Musk took over. Nothing changed. At least now people are more wary that blue checkmark doesn't mean "I can trust this user".
That's why 'Elon Musk airdrop cryptocoin' message is basically today's Nigerian Prince scam. If you can get a blue checkmark for just $8 and call yourself Elon Musk (or any other celebrity), you'll easily make more money on the scam than you spend on a throwaway account.
They also had blue checks before. I know this because I use Twitter for over 10 years now.
A narrow objection along your "simplest interpretation" lines, that Twitter really doesn't verify anything anymore about someone being who they say they are, I could see that potentially being upheld (though presumably easily fixable by not saying "Verified" and changing the icon to an X or whatever).
It's a very valid point to take them to task on: Twitter users are 'Verified' in the same way Teslas are 'Fully Self Driving™': Not at all, and arguably named in a way intended to mislead consumers and give them a false sense of confidence in the product/service.
The blue checkmark is really nothing more than, I paid for this. It gives you certain benefits on the system and it does amplify your voice. But is that really any different than ads?
All for criticism of how much X's reputation has been destroyed and a lot of the choices Elon has made, but this one... it doesn't make any sense to me.
When you see a Blue Checkmark next to "Elon Musk" in 2024, you know he's a shitposter who is trying to sell you the most recent cryptocoin scam.
There are people who are unaware of the difference between 2021 and 2024. As evidenced by this entire discussion.
Nothing to do with trustworthiness of the content being posted, just that this account belongs to this person they are claiming to be.
Both of these goals have been destroyed by the $8/month plan. Anyone can get a blue checkmark. Anyone can claim anything on their account today. Celebrities have no more reason to interact with Twitter as much as they did years ago, and the languishing user base makes this all evident.
I'm not surprised that the $8/month plan is mostly used by scammers who are tricking people who don't understand the difference between 2021 and 2024 Twitter (likely the elderly or other such people who still place trust in the old system).
> Did Elon Musk not have a blue checkmark before he bought twitter?
The problem is that you can _today_ get a blue checkmark while claiming to be anyone. The huge number of impersonators on Twitter should be evidence of that.
Twitter itself describes the blue checkmarks as verifications.
I know that you can ask an ai what x's checkmark actually means but the ai will probably lie to you too, oops I mean hallucinate yeah thats the ticket!
anyways let me search and see if we can clear this up:
Blue checkmark: It currently means two things. 1) An account with this checkmark is a legacy verified account
The checkmark does not imply endorsement from Twitter, and does not mean that tweets from a verified account are necessarily accurate or truthful in any way.
Accounts that receive the blue checkmark as part of a Premium subscription will not undergo review to confirm that they meet the active, notable and authentic criteria that was used in the previous process. Learn more about the blue checkmark here.
I personally think maybe they should use a different icon for the folks paying, the check mark itself has previous meanings (and really, inherently the "check mark" icon itself sort of goes more with the previous meanings especially those users still left over from the time before the reputation of the site was flushed away haha
> even the word "verified" will fool people
You can't actually be this obtuse? It's misleading because twitter calls it a verification, if they didn't, it wouldn't be misleading.
I'm also talking about the check mark as well but yes, the "verification" is misleading also, because there's nothing verified except that the payment went through.
And not only those two items (check mark, the word "verification") but as mentioned elsewhere apparently the check mark actually did mean something more.
When you call my posts "stupid" and me "obtuse", its honestly an invitation to conclude this little conversation as you now have the advantage in the debate, you get to call names and I'd rather not.
Twitter purports it means verified. That's why they might be fined. It's still not clear to me how this is a difficult concept for you to grasp that you keep talking about what it meant elsewhere as opposed to on twitter. On twitter's website, right now it calls them a verification. That's why its misleading. If they called it a proof of sale, or whatever you keep insisting it "really" means, it wouldn't be misleading. But they don't call it that!
>When you call my posts "stupid" and me "obtuse", its honestly an invitation to conclude this little conversation as you now have the advantage in the debate, you get to call names and I'd rather not.
Calling this a conversation is generous. You just assert your own point without any regard to the meaning of anything else actually said. That's why its obtuse. It's stupid because it's facially wrong.
this I'll agree with, have a good one.
In what way do they deceive and abuse? The article doesn’t say.
> a number of high-profile public figures distanced themselves from verification on X
> Hashtags such as #BlockTheBlueChecks trended on X in the backlash, while several celebrities decided to leave the platform
If the public perception has indeed turned against the blue checks, surely there’s no longer a reputation to uphold. What’s X’s legal obligation here?
Some more discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40947128
This is nothing more than a naked attempt to regain that control or at least throttle the flow of inconvenient information.
Very soviet. If you're one of the many govt/NGO types on this site, it's a good time to ask yourself, "Are we the baddies?"
I think the main problem is the organisations (such as various municipalities in EU) that use twitter as an official communication channel, which forces citizens to be there too.
Examples?
Who didn't praise the EU when they were the first government to hit back at these Big Tech psychopath surveillance machines? And yet, as the years go by, it seems like we've seen a power struggle in which tech's vision of its own power became inflated, and the state reminded it of its place.
My enthusiasm for the EU (which once looked like a a constellation of yellow stars to guide the world through the stormy oceans of illiberalism towards a freer tomorrow under president picard or kirk) has waned substantially. Are they a land that overcame the struggles that plagued my homeland (TEXAS), or were they simply an artificial disneyland who's paperthin democracies veiled near totalitarian control by a foreign empire?
I feel this viscerally now that I live in LatAm and can see so transparently the influence of the state dept and its NGOs brewing a counter elite. It even feels odd to think of me and the people here as "being from different countries". Aren't we all Natons, from NATO, loyal to our shared Progress flag and social democratic values, governed by the same managerial elites who go to the same schools, speak the same language, etc? A Gaul and a Jew are in some sense both Roman, during the second century.
I do believe someone was confused by a blue checkmark scammer. I also do believe that has nothing to do with what the "EU says" in this instance. But I'm probably wrong. I was 100% all-in for hilldawg in 2016, Biden for 2024, essentially I never predict things correctly. I've even thought of trying to monetize my bad political instincts by joining one of those crypto prediction markets and betting on the opposite of whatever feels certain to me.
127.0.0.1 x.com 127.0.0.1 twitter.com