Twitter re-introduces 'official' badge after impersonators create chaos

A day after Musk said he has killed the 'official' badge from verified accounts of governments and politicians shortly after its launch along with Twitter's new and revamped Blue subscription, the feature has made a come back.

Twitter's support page tweeted, "To combat impersonation, we’ve added an “Official” label to some accounts."

To combat impersonation, we’ve added an “Official” label to some accounts.

— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) November 11, 2022

The feature has been re-introduced to 'combat impersonation' as with the launch of Twitter Blue subscription that allowed users to pay $8 and get the blue tick of verification, all hell broke loose on the micro-blogging website on Thursday.

Fake 'verified' accounts emerged almost immediately. Accounts with a blue tick of verification of former U.S President Donald Trump  who is banned for life from Twitter was seen before being suspended in a couple of hours. Other fake 'verified' accounts that emerged impersonated Lakers' player LeBron James, Tesla, Twitter, Pharma company Eli & Lilly, Former U.S President George Bush and former British PM Tony Blair.

Jesus Christ, an already existing parody account too got the blue tick of verification and continues to exist on the micro-blogging website.

 Another user tweeted describing this as Twitter and Musk's 'genius' strategy as the fake accounts first paid for the subscription but because they were impersonators, Twitter suspended the accounts and kept their money as well.

Elon Musk replied to the tweet with emojis indicating that he is indeed happy with how the new feature has rolled out.

But it all stopped being funny after it led to spread of massive fake news, like it did in case of Eli & Lily. The impersonating account tweeted that the company would give free insulin to all. The company later issued a clarification and asked users to follow the real account with the username @Lilypad.

With the introduction of 'official' badge, it is hoped that there won't be any further misuse.