According to the Platformer, just before Elon Musk was ready to launch the $8 Blue V paid certification service Twitter Blue, Twitter's internal team warned him, The service can lead to fake account problems and widespread confusion. However, Musk launched the service despite all odds.
The warning, from Twitter's trust and safety division, comes just a week before Musk began enforcing the overhauled authentication system. On November 1, a seven-page document was circulated within Twitter's Trust and Safety department. In the document, the team highlights the dangers in Musk's Twitter Blue plans and advises him on circumventing them.
In their recommendation, Twitter's trust and safety team warned that the new authentication service would allow users to impersonate world leaders, advertisers, brand partners, election officials, and other high-profile personalities. The team also predicts that scammers and dangerous actors are willing to pay $8 to get a blue V badge because the benefits outweigh the costs of doing so.
Platformer said Musk and his personal lawyer, Alex Spiro, and Twitter's director of product management, Esther Crawford, were briefed on the document. However, they appear to have defied those recommendations and launched Twitter Blue on November 9.
As a result, these warnings quickly became a reality. After Twitter Blue went live, scammers and scammers began posting misleading tweets posing as the official accounts of former U.S. President George W. Bush, pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, and Tesla. Twitter was forced to shut down Twitter Blue on Thursday due to a proliferation of fake accounts.