The social network X, owned by Elon Musk, has launched a new transparency feature that displays the country or region where a user's account is registered. This information is available in the «About This Account» tab, which also shows the account creation date and name change history. The New York Times reports on this.
According to Nikita Bir, the product head at X, this is «the first step towards ensuring the integrity of the global public space». The company plans to introduce more tools for verifying content authenticity.
The launch of the feature has elicited mixed reactions. Users noticed that several accounts actively commenting on political issues in the US were registered in other countries, including Japan, New Zealand, Pakistan, and Thailand. This raised suspicions about the origins and true ownership of such profiles.
Accounts frequently shared by Elon Musk himself drew particular attention, significantly boosting their audience.

Criticism and Risks

Critics emphasize that the new feature may pose risks to security and privacy. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin warned that the system is easily manipulable: accounts can fake their location, pretending to be users from the US or the UK. He believes this opens the door for foreign trolls and political campaigns.
Some members of the crypto community labeled the change as «psychotic», as it could endanger real users by exposing their locations without adequate protection.

Political Context

The feature has already become a topic of discussion in the US, where users have started to verify the origins of accounts spreading political messages. Notably, it was found that some accounts branded MAGA (Make America Great Again) are based outside the country. This has raised new questions about foreign influence on American political discourse.
Additionally, a US lawsuit revealed internal documents where social media employees compared their platforms to drugs.