If you see a blue check on Twitter these days, it’s likely because that accounts now pays for Twitter Blue and not because they verified their identity with the company. But thanks to the company firing much of its staff and its digital infrastructure falling apart, you can get your blue check back free of charge thanks to what appears to be a glitch.
As highlighted in this tweet from Ali Segel, all you need to do to bring the blue check back is add some reference to blue checks in your bio. That’s it. Segel specifically used “former blue check,” for instance, but specifics don’t seem to matter. It works with other similar phrases, like “Legacy blue check,” so it doesn’t seem to be contingent on an exact set of words. Once you save your bio and reload the page, you’ll see the check reappear.
This trick only seems to work if your Twitter was a legacy verified account pre-Elon’s Twitter Blue takeover. I never had a blue check—paid or not—so it doesn’t matter what I change my bio to, but as long as you have the right combination of “blue” and “check” in your previously-verified bio, you’ll likely see that blue check reappear next to your name.
It’s not clear why this is happening, but we can presume some bug is causing Twitter to show previously removed verification badges when it sees the right words in the user’s bio. Who knows when the issue will be fixed (if ever), but it’s another entry a long series of breaking points for the social media site.
The confusion doesn’t end there, though. You may know that you didn’t pay for Twitter Blue, the rest of the Twitter community will likely think otherwise. In some cases, Twitter will show that your blue check comes from a Twitter Blue subscription even when you never subscribed to it before. According to Louis Peitzman, the blue check that appears next to his handle is a result of this weird bug since he has the word “checks” in his bio. Twitter would have you believe it’s there because Peitzman subscribes to Twitter Blue. In his words, “I DIDN’T PAY FOR ANYTHING.”
The Chrome extension Eight Dollars, on the other hand, shows Peitzman’s blue check as “Verified,” not “Paid.” The same goes for Senior Technology Editor Beth Skwarecki’s checkmark, although hers appears to come and go as it pleases. Again, this is all built upon some strange glitch.
Screenshot: Jake Peterson
