Elon Musk’s X has begun rolling out a brand new characteristic for consumer profiles that may show details about the account, together with the place it’s primarily based, what number of instances the account has modified its username, the account’s authentic be part of date, and the way the consumer downloaded the X app. The brand new data is supposed to cut back inauthentic engagement on the platform, the place bots typically faux to be people — an issue that might get even tougher to police within the age of AI.
X’s plans for the characteristic had been first introduced in October, when X’s head of product Nikita Bier mentioned the corporate would experiment with displaying this data on profiles, beginning along with his personal account and people of X workers. The thought is that, by exposing these particulars, customers would have the ability to make a extra knowledgeable resolution about whether or not they’re interacting with an genuine account or if the account was a bot or unhealthy actor, trying to sow discord or unfold misinformation.
For example, if an X account’s bio claimed the consumer was from a U.S. state, however their account data reveals that they’re primarily based abroad, you would possibly suspect that they had one other agenda.
Final weekend, Bier responded to a publish the place a consumer had requested Elon Musk to require accounts to show details about the place they’re primarily based by saying to the user, “Give me 72 hours.”
Within the days since, extra individuals have seen the “About this account” characteristic turn out to be out there on their very own profiles.
To view your account data on the internet or within the X cellular app, you’ll click on on the “Joined” date in your profile. From right here, you’re taken to a web page that reveals the date you joined Twitter/X, the place your account is predicated, what number of username modifications have been executed and when the final one was, and the way you’re linked to X — like through the U.S. App Retailer or Google Play, for example.
However whereas some users globally are reporting that the characteristic has appeared on their very own profiles, TechCrunch is just not capable of entry this account data on different individuals’s profiles as of press time. That may very well be as a result of X needs to present customers time to preview their data for accuracy and modify their settings earlier than it rolls out extra broadly.
Particularly, X permits customers to regulate whether or not or not the characteristic shows their nation or if it solely shows their geographical area. Initially, the corporate had mentioned this could be an choice in areas the place free speech might have penalties, however we’re discovering that even U.S. customers can select to set their profile to show both their nation or their area/continent. (Nation is the default, nevertheless.)
To make the change, you may entry the “About your account” setting beneath the X app’s “Privateness and Security” settings.
One reverse engineer digging by the app’s code (see beneath) additionally discovered that X seems to be engaged on an extra characteristic that might show a warning in your account for those who had been utilizing a VPN to masks your location. It’s unclear if or when that characteristic would go stay, but when it does, it will flag to others that the consumer’s “nation or area is probably not correct.”
X didn’t reply to a request for remark concerning the rollout. Nevertheless, Bier joked about all of the current sightings, indicating that individuals had been seeing the characteristic because it started to roll out.
X is just not the primary social community to offer this degree of transparency to customers. Instagram has lengthy supplied a similar “About this account” feature, for example.
