EXCLUSIVE: Elon Musk’s Pay-to-Play Verification System Embarrasses Itself (Again)
In the latest debacle to rock the already-turmoil-plagued Twitter, a senior journalist at TechCrunch has been impersonated by a bot using her name and image. But this isn’t just a case of a rogue AI – it’s a symptom of a deeper problem: Elon Musk’s chaotic and ineffective verification system.
It all started when our journalist noticed that someone had created an exact replica of her profile, complete with a blue checkmark and a paid subscription. The imposter was even using the same default and header photos as our journalist, taken at TechCrunch Disrupt 2022 and a side-eye Chloe, respectively. The bio read, "@Techcrunch senior reporter | journalist," and had the location set to NY, where our journalist is based. The account was created in May 2024 – just a few months after the alleged "hostile takeover" of Twitter by Elon Musk.
But this isn’t the first time Musk’s verification system has been exploited. In the past, the blue checkmark has been weaponized to help bad actors pretend to be celebrities, corporations, and government officials. And now, it seems that even verified journalists are not immune to impersonation.
The irony is that Musk initially claimed that his pay-to-play verification system would weed out the bots on the platform. But clearly, that’s not the case. In fact, our journalist’s impersonator account was so convincing that even our own coworkers and friends were duped into believing it was the real deal.
So what’s the solution? For those who have been impersonated, you can report it to Twitter, which will make you do a third-party verification that involves uploading photos of your government-issued ID and a selfie. But really, this is just a Band-Aid on a bullet wound. The only way to truly solve this problem is for Twitter to overhaul its verification system and ensure that it’s secure and reliable.
But until then, we’re stuck with a platform that’s more concerned with making a quick buck than with keeping its users safe. And that’s just a recipe for disaster.
UPDATE: Twitter has responded to this article, claiming that they are "taking steps to address the issue" and "working to improve the verification system." But until we see some concrete changes, we’ll remain skeptical.
