More confusion on Twitter as Blue subscription disappears a day after launch | BreakingNews.ie

Confusion over Twitter’s direction as a platform has continued after the sign-in option for its Twitter Blue subscription disappeared barely a day after it was launched, and the gray “official” badges returned less than two days after Elon Musk ordered their removal.

It comes as more high-profile staff responsible for key areas such as trust and safety, data protection, cyber security and regulatory compliance suddenly left the social media giant.

On Friday morning, Twitter’s iOS app had lost the ability to sign up for the Twitter Blue service, which gives users a blue confirmation badge if they pay 8 euros a month, even though it was only implemented on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the new gray Official badges of major organizations began reappearing on some Twitter profiles less than two days after Mr Musk halted their introduction hours after his own initial release, calling it an “aesthetic nightmare”.

The blue badges were created as a way to distinguish between verified accounts that had previously been granted by Twitter after they had been verified as authentic, and accounts that had been purchased under the new Twitter Blue system.

The confirmed departure of Yoel Roth, Twitter’s head of trust and safety, has been marked as a major blow to the site after many expressed concern that the Twitter Blue subscription has been abused by bad actors, who buy a blue tick to pose as real people and businesses to engage. fraud and spread false information on the platform.

Roth, a previously little-known executive, had become the public face of Twitter’s content moderation since Musk took over, and had been praised for Twitter’s ongoing efforts to combat harmful misinformation and hate speech.

Musk began laying off thousands of Twitter workers last week as part of austerity measures, telling employees in his first speech on Thursday that he will ban remote work and that there are “difficult times” ahead that could end in the collapse of the company. to the social media platform if they don’t find new ways to make money.

“Without significant subscription revenue, there’s a good chance Twitter won’t survive a future economic downturn,” he said.

Several advertisers have reportedly suspended advertising on Twitter, the company’s biggest source of revenue, due to the company’s ongoing disarray.

US regulators have now said they are following events at Twitter with “deep concern” and have warned Mr Musk that no CEO is “above the law”.

Quite a day!

– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 11, 2022

Meanwhile, the platform has already reported several fake accounts posing as genuine, high-profile individuals using blue checkmarks obtained through Twitter Blue.

US-based PR strategist Max Burns said he had seen fake accounts purchased through Twitter Blue with a verified blue check mark posing as real airline support accounts and asking customers who tried to contact them on Twitter to send messages to the fake accounts. .

“How long will it take for a prankster to take the ticket details of a real passenger and cancel their flight? Or take their credit card information and go on a spending spree?” he said.

“Every airline only needs one big incident to warrant Twitter as a source of customer engagement.”

Mr Burns later said Mr Musk blocked him on Twitter when he asked if the new Twitter owner had anything to comment on the case.

Meanwhile, Mr Musk’s only comments have been to say Thursday was “quite a day”, before adding: “Twitter usage continues to grow. One thing’s for sure: it’s not boring!”

He also claimed that the company had reached an “all-time high in active users.”