Bluesky has finally announced its plans to add verification for profiles, giving blue checkmarks to accounts of notable users. However, the company is taking a different route to X or Meta: verified profiles won’t be up for sale.
And you will not be able to request getting your account verified.
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Bluesky will restart its verification program in two waves. First it will select important public figures and give them the coveted blue checkmark icon on their account. This is the system that was initially followed by Twitter, Facebook and Instagram: you had to actually be famous and verifiable in the public eye.
“Bluesky will proactively verify authentic and notable accounts and display a blue check next to their names,” says the company. The approach is familiar, but the criteria that decide which account is “important” or “notable” enough remain a mystery.
“As this feature stabilizes, we’ll launch a request form for notable and authentic accounts interested in becoming verified or becoming trusted verifiers,” the company says in a blog post.
Trusted Verifiers
The second wave is where things will become a little different. Bluesky is setting up a Trusted Verifiers system, made of independent bodies, such as a media house or government agency, that can verify the accounts of their important employees. The account of Trusted Verifiers will have its own blue tick, but it will appear as a scalloped blue check. The personal accounts they verify will have the familiar rounded check mark.
And yes, that still reminds me somehow of the gold checkmark on X.
Personal accounts that are authenticated by a third-party, such as a journalist profile issued a blue tick by a media organization, would still go through a check by Bluesky’s team.
Bluesky promises full transparency on how an account got verified: hovering over the verification mark, will let users know how an account was verified: by Bluesky directly, or via a trusted verifier.
So how is this different?
Well, the difference is actually in the obvious: for one, you will not be able to request being verified. And perhaps more importantly, Bluesky will not “sell” verification checkmarks like X and now Meta-owned Instagram and Facebook.
Does that mean more authenticity? Time will tell.
