Parody accounts attempting to dupe sports fans into believing fake news has been a big thing on the internet for several years now.
Accounts will change their name and photo to a well known sports insider and tweet out fake news, often fooling thousands of people, who don’t take a close enough look at the account.
That will be going away, though.
Twitter owner Elon Musk announced on Sunday night that any accounts impersonating someone else without clearly specifying parody will be banned.
“Going forward, any Twitter handles engaging in impersonation without clearly specifying “parody” will be permanently suspended,” he announced.
“Previously, we issued a warning before suspension, but now that we are rolling out widespread verification, there will be no warning. This will be clearly identified as a condition for signing up to Twitter Blue.”
“Any name change at all will cause temporary loss of verified checkmark.”
This is a controversial decision, of course, but it should help sports fans when it comes to not falling for the occasional fake news.