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With X eliminating legacy verified accounts in favor of paid checkmarks, it can be difficult to determine an account’s authenticity these days. So, X plans to show additional account history information on profiles.
The About section in user profiles on a handful of X employee accounts will soon display information about the user’s country of origin, the number of times they have changed their username, the app store from which they downloaded X, and more.
“When you read content on X, you should be able to verify its authenticity,” says Nikita Bier, X’s product head. “This is critical to getting a pulse on important issues happening in the world.”
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For now, X is “experimenting” with these changes, says Bier. He’s received feedback from people on X, some of whom argue that requiring a country of origin could pose a safety issue.
“In EU countries where speech can have penalties, we should substitute country for region—to preserve their right of free expression,” he responded. “There will be privacy toggles. However, if a user configures them, that will likely be highlighted on their profile.”
X users can currently edit their bios, but you can put whatever you want in the location section.
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Instagram has long allowed you to see when a user joined the platform, what country the account is located in, any ads they are running, a history of username changes, and accounts with shared followers. When you block an account, you can also block any other accounts they run.
In many ways, this is a problem of X’s own making. When Elon Musk took over Twitter in 2022, he railed against the legacy blue checkmark system as “totally corrupt” because some people allegedly paid for them. There were likely people who gamed the system, but Twitter mostly handed out checkmarks behind the scenes to celebrities, journalists, organizations, and other notable users. In 2016, it started accepting verification applications.
This was important because many officials used Twitter to communicate during emergencies. For years, if an account included a blue checkmark, it was legit. When Musk axed legacy checkmarks and started allowing anyone with $8 to purchase one, people quickly exploited it to create “verified” accounts for well-known celebrities. Three years later, the low barrier to entry makes it very difficult to determine if you’re talking to a real person, a scammer, or a bot. Last week, X removed 1.7 million bots that were engaging in reply spam.
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Jibin is a tech news writer based out of Ahmedabad, India. Previously, he served as the editor of iGeeksBlog and is a self-proclaimed tech enthusiast who loves breaking down complex information for a broader audience.
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