Credible but only 4 stars because despite the legit analysis of how arbitrary and ineffective the verification component of social media sites are, article focuses on the single issues of people getting scammed into buying verification marks from hacked accounts -- a tangential issue to the main points that should be the actual focus of the article. Possibly just another big tech attack piece that plays up certain dangers/threats despite the otherwise solid reporting here.

Great balanced article around the topic of verification of social media. The author manages to bring the reader along from specific cases to the broader problem providing great context and insight on the matter.

This feels like part opinion piece part reporting on recent events/ the verification process on platforms in general. It's mostly about how it's hard to understand how these processes work which makes it seem like you can buy it.

A balanced article identifying a well known problem in social media today. Author Taylor Lorenz dives into the confusion of these verification processes, and the fraud that can grow because of it. I especially liked this from her concluding paragraph, "Until Twitter and Instagram take steps to publicly delineate what exactly verification means on the platform, and offer a transparent public process for vetting people, bad actors will exploit people’s confusion. And more people will continue to dream up theories about how the process works."