Twitter starting Monday will place its text message-based two-factor authentication behind Blue paywall.
As part of this change in policy, Twitter will also turn off 2FA for all non-Blue subscriber accounts completely. Users who do not switch away from SMS verification or pay for the Blue subscription before the deadline are expected to lose the additional security for their accounts leaving them vulnerable to hacking.
2FA, meant to make accounts more secure, requires an account holder to use a second authentication method in addition to a password to access their accounts.
Announced in February, Twitter at the time said the step to change the policy was taken as the company believed phone-number-based 2FA was being abused by “bad actors”.
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Twitter owner Elon Musk also tweeted “Yup” in reply to a user tweet that the company was changing policy “because Telcos Used Bot Accounts to Pump 2FA SMS,” and that the company was losing $60 million a year “on scam SMS.”
While non-Blue subscribers can enable 2FA on their accounts using authenticator apps like Google Authenticator, most similar apps require users to pay to enable 2FA for their accounts.
The move comes as Twitter continues to try to monetise the platform. Earlier, the company also made the blue check mark, previously free for verified accounts of politicians, famous personalities, journalists, and other public figures, open to anyone prepared to pay.
