Blue tick: Pro-Russian accounts apparently buy Twitter verification!

As the Washington Post reports, citing a study by the US research group Reset, pro-Russian accounts have purchased the blue verification symbol for their Twitter accounts in recent weeks. The aim of this acquisition is therefore to achieve a certain reach, since, according to Elon Musk, subscribers to the offer called “Twitter Blue” should be particularly well placed and shown to more users.

Background to the blue tick on Twitter

Even before billionaire Elon Musk , there were blue ticks behind the profile name. At that time, verified Twitter accounts were only given to celebrities, politicians, journalists and companies after a review. The new CEO has now developed a payment model (subscription for €8 per month) for the coveted blue tick.

Furthermore, posts from customers of the new “Hook subscription” will be made more visible on Twitter in the future. Some sources also report that this is already partly happening today. So if you don't display the tweets chronologically, but instead let the algorithms select, posts from accounts that you don't follow can also appear. Here you should mainly see “well-known” accounts with blue ticks.

Spreading false information

According to the Washington Post report, the profiles with the “blue tick” spread false information about the war of aggression in Ukraine and encouraged opposition to Western support for the country. In order to be able to use the verification subscriptions without violating US sanctions, the accounts officially state that they do not operate from Russia.

For example, one of the accounts described itself as “not woke, against Black Lives Matter, against gender pronouns, just anti-imperialism”. “I’m doing my part to stop Western support for the Ukrainian war machine,” writes the owner of another account.

Musk himself commented on the disinformation tweet

As head of Twitter, Elon Musk himself communicated with one of the suspicious accounts displayed under a blue tick. He commented on a post from the account that falsely claimed that 157,000 Ukrainian military personnel and 2,458 NATO soldiers had been killed in the Ukraine war with the words “a tragic loss of life.”

After this action, he called on Twitter users to fact-check these figures, as NATO soldiers do not normally take part in war and he probably became skeptical. However, this meant that the tweet with the fake news received more attention than if Musk had not interacted with the account.

Peace solutions from Musk

A few months ago, Elon Musk proposed a peace solution to the Ukraine war. According to this, votes on future affiliation with Russia or Ukraine should be held under UN supervision in the Ukrainian territories annexed by Russia in violation of international law. According to Musk's suggestion, the Crimean peninsula, which is illegally occupied by Russia, should be recognized as part of Russia. At the same time, Starlink systems from his company “SpaceX” would provide some areas in Ukraine with internet connections after Russian attacks on the local infrastructure.

Recently, however, the technology billionaire spoke out against military use of this technology.

Source: Mirror

Also read: Bot flood on Twitter: The horsemen of the apocalypse?


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