Following his $44 billion acquisition of the platform last year, Twitter CEO Elon Musk had frequently promised to remove the “legacy” or free blue verification tick mark given to famous accounts and others like politicians and journalists. The change has now been implemented.
However, the company’s owner, Elon Musk, paid subscription costs for several high-profile celebrities. People from The Pope, Bill Gates, and the Rock, to former US president Donald Trump, had their blue check removed at the time of reporting, but the accounts belonging to celebrities including Beyoncé, Tom Brady, Taylor Swift, LeBron James, Stephen King, and Ice-T, retained the tick.
On Thursday, Twitter started deleting the historical blue checkmarks from specific accounts that were not paying the US$8 monthly fee, making it unclear as to which accounts were legitimate. The blue check verified badge doesn’t mean that person is whom they say they are anymore. It now just means they pay for a subscription and use a phone number.
Government accounts, such as government agencies or heads of government such as the US president, Joe Biden, have grey ticks that note their connection with government agencies. Also, Officials such as Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Droupadi Murmu still retained grey verification tick marks on their accounts, to confirm they were part of the government. However, it does not appear that the grey tick extends to every politician.
As of Friday, prominent Indian users including M.K. Stalin, the chief minister of Tamil Nadu, Rahul Gandhi, and Shah Rukh Khan had all lost their verification marks.
Furthermore, Twitter’s terms of service were updated to show that the company was officially identified as ‘X Corp.’
Yellow ticks are mostly given to media accounts. Last week on numerous media platforms, Musk started adding disclaimers like “state-affiliated” and “government funded”.