Upon arrival at the board of directors of Twitter, Elon Musk wanted to bet on Blue, a paid subscription model on the platform. The irruption of the new CEO has led to important changes with an eye on achieving income that makes the company viable. But a good part of the modifications have not been well received by the users.
A couple of days ago Twitter announced that only Twitter Blue users will be able to use the SMS two-step authentication system, a security feature that all users now enjoy. Therefore, it will no longer only be necessary to pay to verify the account, write longer tweets or get rid of advertising, now the platform wants to reinforce the attractiveness of the premium subscription by urging users to pay to make their account more difficult to hack .
Only Twitter Blue users will be able to use double authentication via SMS
The statement was made through the company’s official blog
Getty Images/iStockphoto
Unlike a good part of the news on the platform, this time it was not Elon Musk who announced the change. The statement was made through the company’s official blog. “Starting today we will no longer allow accounts to sign up for the 2FA SMS method unless they are Twitter Blue subscribers,” the announcement reads.
The company has warned that the availability of these changes could vary between operators and geographical areas. The reasons for this decision have to do with the popularity of SMS two-factor authentication. Twitter explains that “unfortunately we’ve seen bad actors use and abuse phone number-based 2FA.”
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As a consequence, the company began to consider limiting the service, previously available to all users. After limiting it to those who pay for the Twitter Blue subscription, there are two alternatives to maintain two-step authentication: do it through a specific application for it, in which the user receives a temporary code each time they log in, or use a Security key.
Those users who have activated double authentication and do not pay a premium subscription will have a period of thirty days to either maintain authentication through one of the alternatives, or dispense with it by deactivating it.
The announcement of the new measure has been made through the official Twitter blog
The statement was made through the company’s official blog
JOHN G. MABANGLO / EFE
As indicated by the company through the statement, “after March 20, 2023 we will no longer allow non-Twitter Blue subscribers to use text messages as a 2FA method.” In other words, this measure will be implemented exactly within four weeks, and then those users without the Blue version will see double authentication disappear.
This change comes shortly after Musk began promoting the use of the platform’s paid subscription, adding new features and benefits such as account verification, a new color code, the ability to compose longer tweets and see less. advertisements.
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Another novel decision by the company is to share the revenue generated by advertising with content creators who subscribe to the paid version, in addition to charging $1,000 per month to those companies that want to maintain the gold badge on the social network.
SMS two-factor authentication is a basic feature that should be available for free with any online service. In order to strengthen its revenue stream, Twitter has decided to limit its availability to the paid version. This sudden decision is likely to bring legal problems to the company again.
