On Wednesday, Twitter was the victim of a massive hack, which saw numerous name accounts — belonging to people like Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates — mysteriously tweeting out a Bitcoin scam. The social media giant quickly tried to enact damage control, and one thing they seem to have done is render certain accounts unable to tweet at all, at least beyond retweets.
This comes from The Verge, who pointed out that block appeared to mostly, if not exclusively, affect verified accounts. Not all accounts that contain a blue check mark were affected, and it’s not clear why certain ones were targeted while others were not. It was also not revealed when those locked accounts would be set free to tweet about how they were not allowed to tweet for some as-yet-to-be-determined period of time.
The Twitter support account would only reveal that they were “investigating” the hack and “taking steps to fix it.” They also informed users that they would be unable to reset passwords while the investigation ensues.
You may be unable to Tweet or reset your password while we review and address this incident.
— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) July 15, 2020
The news left the social media site bereft of the rich, the famous, the powerful, and randos who somehow managed to score a blue check mark, possibly because they worked in media. Those that hadn’t been raptured to some temporary oblivion, predictably, made jokes about a cabal sometimes disparagingly referred to as the “Blue Check Mark Mafia.”
me during the 20 minutes of blue checks being banned on here pic.twitter.com/TlUmcKA5PE
— josh lewis (@thejoshl) July 15, 2020
Me irl when the blue checks can’t tweet pic.twitter.com/qoO9m1mqAK
— publius (@SmugPublius) July 15, 2020
When they came for the blue checks I said nothing because I wasn’t verified
— Louis Kersten (@louisvk) July 15, 2020
When the blue checks leave us behind: pic.twitter.com/4zjGIRqutd
— Lila Byock (@LByock) July 15, 2020
in the absence of blue checks i am now declaring myself the president of twitter
— abolish the police (@infinite_scream) July 15, 2020
Blue checks right now like: pic.twitter.com/r1QxheylrR
— Liam (@WakeInShite) July 15, 2020
Of course, some made a joke while pointing out that some accounts are, alas, useful and even necessary to keep our futuristic society running.
Me, a twitter user: lol blue checks can’t tweet about cake rn
Me, a disasterologist: Oh god. Emergency management agencies, NWS, etc. cannot send out emergency warnings via twitter right now.
— Dr. Samantha Montano (@SamLMontano) July 15, 2020
As of this writing, many verified accounts were still unable to tweet.
(Via The Verge)