Telangana CM’s office, Tollywood A-listers lose Twitter blue tick

HYDERABAD: Much like others around the world, several Twitter users from Hyderabad were hit by Friday blues as they woke up to see their accounts stripped off the blue tick of verification.
Apart from common people, this laundry list comprised a host of officials handles, including that of chief minister, K Chandrasekhar Rao's office - @TelanganaCMO.

Those like @GHMCOnline, @HMDA_gov, @TelanganaDGP too lost their blue ticks to Twitter's new move of disabling the verification feature, unless a user buys a subscription. While government handles like @hydcitypolice, @TelanganaCS were spared the onslaught as they have already been given the free grey tick - a mark of being a government handle - a clutch of Tollywood celebrities weren't that lucky.
Stars including @KChiruTweets, @alluarjun, @VenkyMama , @AlwaysRamCharan, @Samanthaprabhu2, @KeerthyOfficial etc were left without the legacy verification marks on Friday, while those like @iamNagarjuna , @tarak9999, @urstrulyMahesh managed to keep them as they have subscribed to Twitter Blue.
It comes for a payment of ₹900 a month and has been availed of by the likes of ministers KT Rama Rao, Harish Rao among others.
Letter to Twitter
When TOI reached out to the Telangana digital media wing - that handles official Twitter accounts - they expressed serious concern over the sudden changes. They fear that it can lead to impersonations. "We hope the damage will be minimal until the grey tick marks are restored for government handles. For law enforcement agencies, impersonation can become a big issue until then. Earlier, verifying these handles used to be a very elaborate process, but now they have suddenly removed it with no attempt to reach out to state governments," said Konatham Dileep, director, Telangana digital media wing.
He said that the department has now reached out to Twitter to restore the tick marks of @TelanganaCMO and Minister of IT and MAUD's official account - @MinisterKTR
The wing has also started scanning through Twitter to look for fake accounts impersonating elected representatives or government departments. "Few months ago, we had to deal with a case of an account impersonating minister KTR when Twitter blue was rolled out in the US. We directly messaged the profile and informed Twitter as well and took it down. We are on the lookout for such cases and will also file police cases," Dileep said.
In fact, soon after the blue ticks disappeared, some fake accounts of T-town actors had started doing the rounds on Twitter. Many are concerned, more such accounts will surface in the days to come and might become a cyber crime issue.
"Though actors are not very active on Twitter, will now have to pay for the verified handles, primarily to stop troll pages and rival fan accounts from creating nuisance. Some have already cropped up with verified handles (on paying for it) and are getting visibility. They also tend to spread misinformation. Actors will have to get the subscription immediately to counter such things," said a public relations professional from Tollywood.
'New feature a blessing'
While many have been finding fault with Twitter's new rule, some Hyderabadis say it's come as a blessing.
Hyderabad's bicycle mayor - Sanathana Selvan - for instance feels that it's allowed those like him to increase his reach. He subscribed to Twitter Blue about a month ago and has seen a 20% to 30% rise in followers and impressions on each tweet.
"The algorithm has certainly helped in pushing my tweets to more people but at the end of the day, content still matters. Blue also allows me to tweet more elaborately," said Selvan.