It’s so easy to create an online account on social media these days, which is why more often than not, you’ll find a lot of newly-created accounts used for harassments, trolling, cyberbullying, and more. To help combat that, X announced a new About This Account feature . Unfortunately, it seems to be doing more harm than good for now.
X launches About This Account to chaos
According to the announcement by the company’s head of product, Nikita Bier, this feature would allow users to see the country or region an account is based in . “This is an important first step to securing the integrity of the global town square. We plan to provide many more ways for users to verify the authenticity of the content they see on X.”
On paper, it sounded like a good idea. But in reality? Not so much. It seems that while X might have had good intentions behind the About This Account feature, the rollout wasn’t as smooth as the company would have liked. This includes inaccurate data, which Bier admitted “was not 100%,” especially for older accounts.
The reason for this is because people might be traveling. Or a company could have staff working in different parts of the world managing their social media accounts. Or it could be due to VPN use, where their location shown would be the server they’re connected to. Also, as one user points out, grouping users by region could have certain political implications .
Privacy implications
That being said, while we get what X is trying to do here, many users have pointed out the privacy implications of this feature. As one user writes, X should only include the sign-up country. This is because as users travel, it might end up doxxing their location. This might be particularly important to political figures, celebrities, and more, who might not appreciate having this information publicized.
However, according to Bier, the location updates on a randomized and delayed schedule. Another user points out how hinting at a region could potentially endanger users like activities or journalists. While Bier says the feature will come with a toggle that only shows your region, especially in places where speech has penalties, not everyone thinks it’s enough.
