In November 2022, a brand new Twitter account with the handle @AdamSchefterN0T and a display name matching that of ESPN analyst Adam Schefter tweeted that Las Vegas Raiders head coach Josh McDaniels had been fired. "Josh McDaniels is out as head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders, sources tell ESPN," the tweet read.
However, this was not true.
Besides the Twitter handle including the word "N0T" (with a zero instead of an "O"), the account's bio and pinned tweet said that it publishes "parody."
The @AdamSchefterN0T account looked to have paid for the new Twitter service that provided a checkmark badge, which appeared the same as verification badges had in the past. This made the purported news appear more credible. It was suspended after the tweet had been live for around two hours and had received close to 10,000 engagements.
Twitter's new owner, Elon Musk, previously said that he would "permanently suspend any account on the social media platform that impersonates another," according to The Associated Press.
Earlier the same day, Musk had tweeted, "Please note that Twitter will do lots of dumb things in coming months. We will keep what works & change what doesn't."
This story will be updated if any further developments come to pass.
For further reading, minutes before we published this article, we reported on another story about a parody account that impersonated NBA superstar LeBron James and said he was leaving the Los Angeles Lakers.
Source:
Bajak, Frank. "Musk Threatens to Boot Twitter Account Impersonators." The Associated Press, 7 Nov. 2022, https://apnews.com/article/elon-musk-twitter-impersonators-ban-6c5cc834a38a29a6fb38e4a85441a3a1.