A new feature meant to boost transparency on Elon Musk’s platform relies on data that researchers say can be inaccurate or easily spoofed.
Advocates for transparency on social media cheered this weekend when X, the app owned by tech billionaire Elon Musk, rolled out a new feature that disclosed what the company said were the country locations of accounts.
The feature appeared to unmask a number of accounts that were portraying themselves as belonging to Americans but in reality were based in countries such as India, Thailand and Bangladesh.
But by Monday, the effectiveness and accuracy of the feature were already in question, as security experts, social media researchers and two former X employees said the location information could be inaccurate or spoofed using widely available technology, such as virtual private networks (VPNs), to hide their locations.
I say, it should be mandatory to show the country of origin on social media. Including if it’s via vpn
bots. I wonder how many are here ?
Beep boop
This made me momentarily miss TOTALLYNOTROBOTS
HAVE YOU PROCESSED UPGRADING YOUR TARGETING ALGORITHM TO INCREASE YOUR HIT RATIO?
Beep beep
And then the guy says, “Well, it’s a hell of an act. What do you call yourselves?” He says, “The Aristocrats.”
Truly you are a connoisseur…
I don’t like how there’s a bunch of misinformation mixed into this whole situation. Lots of fake accounts got passed around as legit ones.
It almost feels like an exercise in sowing confusion and muddying the waters to me.
Yeah Xwitter has shut the feature off temporarily so that the accounts that were exposed by it can set up VPNs and look like they totally come from the United States and not the countries that they were discovered to have been coming from.
Absolutely. Release something to sow discord, while revealing truth. Confusion, acceleration, anger, fear.
Well now that it got out in the open, I doubt troll accounts will get caught off guard like that again. At least not the smart / state sponsored ones
I mean if it’s based on the time of creation it would to me that’s the idea of it though. IE the troll accounts that have spent 5 years building up a following, the only way to salvage them if their creation location was bad, is to delete them and start a new one from a VPN in the country they are supposed to be from. At which point smart people are going to note “the wave of accounts made in 2025-2026 and note that timing”.
Course unless Elon works to change that rule, not tie in the original country etc, or make a blue checkmark feature “anti-doxing” to protect your private information like country.
Honestly, I would be very much down to see this on Lemmy too. “This account was registered from country X” “Last post from country Y” (Or alternatively, “Last post from known VPN” so you at least know it’s happening.)
It adds some interesting context at the very least.
Did you know Americans (and other nationals of any country) also live in other countries? Personally, I could be in several different countries at any given time, not accounting for VPN use.
The feature doesn’t reveal much.
That said, I also support the feature because it is data held by privileged users already. Make all privileged data public. No one should have more rights than anyone else, besides the greater rights we have over ourselves.
I travel constantly and use Lemmy. I don’t know what I’d do if someone attacked any opinion or statement I made because of the country I posted from. Have to explain each time why my IP says whatever country?
Right. It is a bad mechanism if used for that purpose.
The correct way to do what they actually want is to have a global, anonymous nationality verification. There are all kinds of ways to do this that aren’t dystopian. Then, if desired, there can be attestation to nationality without disclosure of personal information.
That would allow us to appropriately measure the national origins of content, and I could see the use of that.
Instead, people are supporting a deeply flawed mechanism as “good enough,” as they always do. It is lazy, sloppy, and dangerous.
To that end, if it continues to go that way, there are countless ways to undermine it. That’s also what makes it so stupid. Dishonest actors will easily circumvent it, and honest actors will once again be left suffering.
Did you know Americans (and other nationals of any country) also live in other countries? Personally, I could be in several different countries at any given time, not accounting for VPN use.
So what? So for every 1 in 100 times an “American” account is revealed to be posting from overseas it’s actually an American? 1% false positives, I’ll take that, fine. This still seems useful to me.
I already said it is useful to know. It isn’t useful to take drastic action with, however.
“That it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer.”
- Benjamin Franklin
Trolls and troll farms will circumvent this as soon as it becomes a feature.
Naaaaaaaah, as if any comment could contain BS
This User commented from Ilha da Queimada Grande
Posted from the Thaumasia Quadrangle
did not read the article ywt, but I have this pic floating around in a group chat im in, no idea if its true but lmao
Its faked, but funny
It’s not faked
Snoops was unable to verify it. Do you have a source for that claim that it’s real?
I think a feature like this should really be part of an internet transparency law…
Glad Elon revealed so much.
Anyone have a theory for why he’s doing this now?
My theory: I doubt Musk had any hands on direct control in the decision. If he did, the feature would probably still be active. My guess is one of the developers quietly pushed the update because, looks around, reasons. It was reversed so quickly I have a feeling Musk was blindsided like most of us.
I bet, musk demanded a thing, was told it would be a bad idea, he fired that guy, the next guy just does what he says, musk is completely shocked that the entire movement telling him he’s cool were just foreign psyops and he ordered it shut off. Fired the guy who listened to him, for good measure.
“oops I accidentally introduced a bug that caused it show up, my bad, I’ll fix it riiiiiiiiiight after my break”
If he did, the feature would probably still be active.
I have a feeling he would never approve it to begin with.
Exactly my point. Once he found out about the change it was squashed.
Oh shit, I didn’t realize they reversed it. That makes sense now.
