Elon Musk drops new rules for Twitter parody or impersonation accounts

Impersonation has become a point of contention on Twitter following Elon Musk's newly revised and rolled out Twitter Blue subscription service that allows paying customers to gain the iconic verification checkmark badge.

The new Twitter Blue service became available on November 9, and since then, numerous accounts across various industries have decided to pay the $7.99 fee to receive their blue verified check mark and a range of other features. Leading up to the release of Twitter Blue, there was a wave of already-verified accounts impersonating Elon Musk, with celebrities and public figures such as H3 Podcast host Ethan Klein and comic Kathy Griffin changing their display names to "Elon Musk" and then posting several tweets in an attempt to impersonate his account.

Now that Twitter Blue is available, we are seeing this account impersonation spread beyond just targeting Elon Musk, with companies such as Nintendo, Twitch, Valve, and many more becoming victims of impersonation. Most notably, Twitter's own Twitter account was impersonated by a random user that created a new Twitter account, paid for Twitter Blue to receive the verification badge, and then proceeded to post a tweet that claimed Twitter Blue was now free for crypto/NFT holders who "authenticated" their digital wallet assets by clicking a link.

This fraudulent post by this nefarious account holder, unfortunately, gained more than 35,000 retweets before Twitter was able to identify that it was a scam.

Now, Musk has taken to his personal Twitter account to announce some new rules when it comes to parody or impersonation accounts. According to the Tesla CEO, any accounts engaging in a parody of another account must include "parody" in their name and not just their bio. Musk further explained that any accounts "doing parody impersonations. Basically, tricking people is not ok."

These aren't necessarily new rules that Musk has thrown into Twitter's Terms of Service, as Twitter already required users that were engaging in parody accounts to have "parody" clearly displayed in the accounts display name. However, it seems there will be some new rules officially written into Twitter's Terms of Service as Musk has agreed to a suggestion that the platform's Terms of Service should stipulate a rule under "malicious intent or with the intent to deceive".

In other news, Kanye West, now officially known as Ye, may have to watch Adidas sell his famous Yeezy shoes under different branding following the long-standing deal between the two parties dissolving. The rapper, who was partnered with Adidas since 2013, but it separate itself from Ye after he began posting antisemitic comments on social media platforms.

• Read more: Kanye West to watch Adidas sell Yeezys under new branding after deal collapses