X has rolled out a new ‘About This Account’ feature showing when an account joined, username changes, and importantly, geographic location.
This aims to increase transparency and help users identify authentic accounts versus bots or foreign actors involved in misinformation.
While this is a good step towards platform integrity, the geographic data has raised questions due to inaccuracies.
Many prominent right-wing accounts claiming US identity show up as based in countries like Japan, Pakistan, or New Zealand, sparking controversy.
It appears these errors stem from factors like VPN use, travel, global teams, or outdated IP data, which X’s product team acknowledges and is actively working on fixing.
The incomplete or imprecise location information has led some users to lose confidence in the feature’s reliability temporarily.
Despite these challenges, the rollout represents an important move for X in building a safer, more trustworthy global digital public square.
If refined over time, the feature can help users better evaluate accounts and reduce foreign influence and bot-driven manipulation.
Going forward, X is likely to expand and improve account transparency tools, potentially including VPN detection warnings to flag masked locations.
Overall, this initiative signals a positive direction for combating misinformation, but its success hinges on data accuracy and user trust repair in the coming phases.
