Topline

Twitter proprietor Elon Musk on Friday introduced a brand new color-coded scheme for verifying accounts—a guide course of that might pressure the corporate’s shrunken workforce—that comes scorching on the heels of an aborted try at overhauling verification that flooded the platform with a chaotic stream of imposter accounts.

Elon Musk mentioned Twitter will overhaul its verification system.

NurPhoto through Getty Photographs

Key Information

Twitter’s new color-coded verification system would tentatively launch on Friday, December 2, Musk tweeted.

Musk mentioned Twitter will now manually authenticate accounts as a way to keep away from the deluge of imposters that emerged when the agency opened up its verification badges to paying customers of the Twitter Blue subscription service.

The ever-present blue verify mark presently used for all verified accounts might be changed with a system of blue, gold and grey ticks, Musk mentioned.

Gold ticks might be given to verified firm accounts and grey ticks might be handed to “authorities” accounts.

Blue checks will now be given to “all” verified people, celeb or not, Musk mentioned, explaining that the boundary of what constitutes notable is “in any other case too subjective.”

A “secondary tiny brand” may very well be added to a person’s account to point out they belong to a corporation, Musk added, promising a “longer clarification” on the system subsequent week.

What We Don’t Know

It’s not clear whether or not or not customers should pay as a way to get verified. Musk’s aborted try to revamp the verification system earlier this month opened up “verified” standing to anybody prepared to pay for Twitter’s premium service, Twitter Blue. The service handed over a blue checkmark to anybody paying the $7.99 a month charge and didn’t verify the identification of account holders, unleashing a torrent of “verified” accounts impersonating others. Drugmaker Eli Lilly, former President Donald Trump, Pope Francis, NBA star LeBron James, video games big Nintendo and Musk’s personal Tesla have been among the many slew of excessive profile figures and firms (typically convincingly) parodied.

Essential Quote

Musk described the implementation of guide verification as a “painful, however obligatory” step to deal with impersonation. Given the mass firing and exodus of staffers since Musk took the reins in October, this course of is probably going so as to add appreciable pressure to Twitter’s already pressured workforce.

What To Watch For

Replying to questions on Twitter asking whether or not the verify marks will truly assist customers differentiate between related accounts, Musk acknowledged the likelihood the scheme won’t go to plan and vowed to behave accordingly. Deliberate impersonation or deception will lead to account suspension, he mentioned, including that customers might use organizational affiliation, biography and follower counts to assist distinguish between accounts with the identical title. Musk mentioned Twitter might present follower counts underneath individuals’s names on tweets and permit filtering based mostly on follower quantity “if it truly turns into an issue.”

Forbes Valuation

$191.6 billion. That’s the estimated internet price of Elon Musk, in keeping with Forbes’ real-time tracker. The determine makes Musk the richest individual on Earth. He purchased Twitter for $44 billion in October and is finest recognized for main and cofounding electrical carmaker Tesla, rocket agency SpaceX and tunneling enterprise Boring Firm.