Some Twitter users with more than one million followers have had their blue ticks re-instated, without paying to subscribe.
Beyoncé, Harry Kane, Richard Osman and Victoria Beckham are among those to have their blue tick back.
Before the platform was bought by Elon Musk, Twitter’s blue tick was a badge of authentication given for free. The tick allowed users to verify that the a profile was authentic, after the platform was swarmed with bots and accounts claiming to be famous names spreading misinformation.
However as of last week, the blue tick has become a symbol that the account has subscribed to Twitter Blue – paying around $8 a month to receive the tick.
Those who decided not to pay the fee started to lose their ticks. However the process was a messy one, with many celebrities having their blue tick reappear, despite confirming they had not paid.
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The accounts with blue ticks re-appearing however do seem to be done at Twitter’s discretion, as some highly followed accounts remain unverified, with smaller ones having the symbol reappear.
Mr Musk also claimed that he paid for the subscriptions himself on behalf of the author Stephen King, the actor William Shatner and the basketball player Lebron James who had all criticised the scheme.
Twitter has not revealed how many people have chosen to subscribe so far but the app firm Sensor Tower estimated to TechCrunch that the platform had around 386,000 subscribers in March 2023.
