Twitter is bringing back the gray checkmarks to accounts owned by brands, publishers, and other public figures, according to Engadget.
On November 9, the social media platform rolled out its official gray badges to official accounts. It's the checkmark that you cannot buy with the platform's new $8 Blue subscription.
However, just hours later, the company paused its deployment. Moreover, the company also pulled them back from accounts that already had them.
Now, they are rolling out the gray checkmarks again.
Twitter Adds Official Label to Combat Impersonation
According to Twitter VP Esther Crawford, they really intend to bring back the gray checkmarks, However, they are just handing them out first to government and commercial entities.
According to The Verge, the badge has now started reappearing on brand and company accounts like Coca-Cola, Wired, Twitter, and Ars Technica.
Other publications such as The New York Times, Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, and Wired also have them now.
The social media platform decided to add the "Official" label to some accounts in its effort to combat impersonation, according to Twitter Support.
The company's new CEO, Elon Musk, said that there are too many "corrupt legacy Blue 'verification' checkmarks" in the platform.
After the company rolled out its paid verification service, many fake accounts paid $8 for the subscription and got themselves verified.
It caused mayhem in the platform when legitimate-looking accounts started tweeting out questionable things.
For instance, a fake Nintendo of America posted a picture of Mario giving Twitter the middle finger. There was also a fake LeBron James that announced that he was requesting a trade.
While Twitter announced that it was not "putting an 'Official' label on accounts" yet, it issued a statement that it is "aggressively going after impersonation and deception."
With the rollout of the gray checkmarks, people could easily figure out if they're dealing with the legit accounts of companies and public figures.
Read Also: Twitter Introduces Blue Checkmark Verified Accounts
Elon Musk 'Killed' the Gray Checkmarks Hours After its Deployment
As mentioned earlier, the company rolled out the gray checkmark indicating the that the company or entity is an official account. But just hours later, Musk claimed that he "just killed" the deployment.
With that announcement, the gray checkmarks vanished from those accounts that only just got them. However, the company said that they will roll it out again.
The new owner of Twitter justified his move by reiterating his view that tying the original checkmark to a Twitter Blue subscription will democratize the service as originally envision for the social media platform.
Meanwhile, the social media platform implemented a new rule wherein accounts created from its $8 Blue subscription on or after November 9 were blocked. This move is done in order to prevent them from getting instant verification.
In addition, the owner of the social media platform also announced that from there on, those accounts doing parody impersonation must include the word "parody" in their name, and not just in their bio.
While that has been included in Twitter's policy for years, it seems that starting today the company will be enforcing a stricter rule in light of recent events.
Related Article: Twitter to Debut Gray Checkmark And 'Official' Label for Verified Accounts
