Gray instead of blue: Twitter removes free verification ticks

Elon Musk’s Twitter has removed the verification ticks that used to be given free to celebrities and relevant people. Now only paying subscription customers have the same-looking icon on their profiles—but with no real identity verification. Among the celebrities whose accounts lost the white tick on a blue background late Thursday were footballer Cristiano Ronaldo, actress Halle Berry and numerous music stars including Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Shakira and Justin Timberlake.

At the same time, bestselling author Stephen King and basketball player LeBron James, who previously refused subscription payments, surprisingly kept their verification symbols. Twitter owner Elon Musk said he personally pays for some profiles.

According to technology blog The Verge, James declined Twitter’s offer to pay for the subscription. The hook remained at first anyway. Stephen King made it a point to state that he was not a subscription customer. “You’re welcome,” Musk tweeted back.

Musk criticizes “corrupt” award

The explanatory text for the ticks says that the account is paying for a subscription and its telephone number has been confirmed. In the case of James and King, Twitter thus gives the impression that two prominent critics of the new system are now taking part. At the same time, Rihanna and Taylor Swift, among others, kept their verification symbols – and initially did not comment on what basis. Otherwise, users with the check mark often identify themselves as fans of Musk.

Twitter introduced the symbols so users could be sure that no one was impersonating a celebrity, politician, or athlete. After buying Twitter for around 44 billion dollars, tech billionaire Elon Musk claimed that the procedure for assigning the ticks was “corrupt” and that some of them were distributed arbitrarily by Twitter employees. The system divided users into “lords and pawns”, so everyone should now pay for it. Now, of all people, Musk himself decided who should keep a tick without paying for it.

Wrong profiles appeared

The first fake profiles appeared on Friday night. A tweet from “@NYC_GOVERNMENT” claimed that this was the official account of the city of New York. The real profile “@nycgov” doesn’t have a tick icon either. A profile with the name and photo of writer JK Rowling apologized for her controversial statements over the past few months. Both fake accounts were blocked a little later.

Now anyone can pretend to be her, criticized the singer Dionne Warwick the day before, whose profile also lost the verification tick. Even when the payment hook was introduced in November, there was chaos with deceptively real fake accounts from some celebrities and companies. After that, additional precautions were introduced.

Traditionally, most of Twitter’s business has come from advertising. After the Musk acquisition, there was a churn of advertisers. He now hopes more for subscription revenues from users and companies. Making the tick icon part of a subscription is part of the plan. With the new model, there is actual verification only for companies. But they should also pay significantly more money for their golden tick: 950 euros per month instead of 9.52 euros for individual users.

ETH Zurich earthquake service can no longer tweet automatically

Musk has left no stone unturned on Twitter since the takeover. He also changed the price model for interface access, for example. Corporate customers should pay at least 42,000 dollars a month for this in the future. For example, without access to Twitter interfaces, software from other providers cannot publish tweets on the platform.

That required according to Blick already a prominent victim from Switzerland: the earthquake service of the ETH Zurich. Their Twitter robot quickly provided information about where and how badly the earth was shaking in Switzerland. But that’s over now – at least for the time being.

“Due to changes in Twitter’s terms and conditions, we are currently no longer able to tweet automatic earthquake reports,” writes the earthquake service. We are currently waiting for feedback from Twitter. “In the event of significant earthquakes in Switzerland and in neighboring countries, we will try to tweet manually,” it said. However, there will be delays. (dpa/brother)