Some Twitter users — especially trolls, racists, misogynists, and fascists — covet the blue checkmark Twitter adds to “verified” accounts, in the mistaken belief that it gives them a seal of legitimacy. Recently, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey answered customer service questions in a Wired interview and one of the questions he got was about how to receive a blue checkmark. Dorsey said, “There’s a guy named Kayvon, and he handles all the verification, which is the blue checkmark. So if you either DM him or mention him, you have a high probability of getting a blue checkmark.”
Kayvon Beykpour is product lead at Twitter, and as you might imagine, every Plain-Belly Sneetch in the twittersphere started DMing him as if he was Sylvester McMonkey McBean with a check-on machine. Beykpour was forced to add a notice to his bio that read, “SORRY I’M NOT THE “VERIFICATION GOD” AND WON’T BE ABLE TO VERIFY YOU.”
From The Daily Dot:
The Daily Dot reached out to Beykpour over Twitter to inquire about his newly appointed title as verification god but did not receive a response by publication time.
Unfortunately for all the unverified accounts, it appears that Beykpour will not be granting verification status anytime soon. And while Twitter in 2016 offered users a way to apply for verification, the process was put on hold just a year later.