Twitter Restores Blue Ticks For High-Profile Users

Twitter has silently reinstated the blue verification ticks, or gold ticks in the case of organisations, for many high-profile users after removing them last week.

Beyoncé, Harry Kane, Richard Osman and Victoria Beckham had their blue ticks restored.

Before Elon Musk bought Twitter last year the blue tick was offered for free and was intended to show that a high-profile account was genuine, in order to reduce fake accounts and misinformation.

The checkmark now indicates a user or group has paid for the Twitter Blue subscription service, with a verification process being attached to payment.

‘Legacy’ checkmarks

Musk said the “legacy” free checkmarks would disappear on Thursday, 20 April, a date apparently chosen because of its connection to cannabis culture.

But over the weekend almost every celebrity with more than 1 million followers had the checkmarks restored without paying for them.

One notable exception was Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s co-founder, who is currently operating a decentralised rival to Twitter called Bluesky.

Dorsey’s account reportedly did not initially have its checkmark restored, but as of Monday morning the tick had reappeared.

Non-paying celebrities

Musk said he himself had paid for the subscriptions of three celebrities who had complained about the switch to paid verification – Stephen King, LeBron James and William Shatner.

In October 2022 King had written, “They should pay me. If that gets instituted, I’m gone like Enron.”

Some users have complained that there is currently no way of distinguishing Twitter Blue users from “legacy” verified users, meaning that those who have not paid nevertheless display a message saying their status was granted “because they are subscribed to Twitter Blue”.