It may have just become a little easier to get the blue check mark on Twitter. 
The company has just announced that they are opening applications to apply for verification on the platform. As a refresher, being verified gives users a blue check mark on their profile to “let people know that an account of public interest is authentic”.
Typically, this means celebrities, journalists, athletes, politicians and other high-profile figures that are likely to be impersonated on Twitter. While being verified gives you a few special features like a verified-only notification feed (to see notifications from other verified accounts), it doesn’t fundamentally change the Twitter experience.
In the announcement the company said that 187,000 users are currently verified on the platform, which is about .06% of the company’s 310M monthly active users.
The company did previously let users apply for verification, but pulled the feature years ago – probably after being inundated with unworthy applications. Since then verification has been manually done at Twitter’s own discretion, until today.
In order to be verified, users will have to make sure their account has a verified phone number and email address, bio, profile picture, birthday and website.
The company also said they will ask you to tell them why you should be verified, and potentially ask for a government-issued ID to confirm your identity.
It seems that the move to open applications is designed to help identify creators and influences that should be verified, but Twitter hasn’t been able to find on their own. According to Twitter’s VP of User Services Tina Bhatnagar, the move is part of a larger move to help “people finding great, high-quality accounts to follow, and for these creators and influencers to connect with a broader audience”.
Users can apply here, or read more about being verified here.
