一名17歲的高中生完成了一項普通推特用戶無法企及的壯舉：那就是獲得一個令人羨慕的藍色“認證”標誌。然而，據CNN Business（美國有線電視新聞網商務頻道）報道，他並沒有驗證自己的賬戶，而是創建了一個假的共和黨國會候選人的賬戶並設法使該賬戶獲得了推特認證。A 17-year-old high school student was able to pull off a feat that’s out of reach for many ordinary Twitter users: getting a coveted blue “verified” checkmark. However, he didn’t get his own account verified, instead managing to convince Twitter to verify an account he created for a fake Republican candidate for Congress, reports CNN Business. 在對虛構的國會候選人安德魯·沃爾茲進行覈實之前，推特的一名發言人曾強調，“最糟糕的情況是，我們覈實了根本不是候選人的人。”The verification of the fictitious congressional candidate, Andrew Walz, comes on the heels of a Twitter spokesperson emphasizing that “our worst-case scenario is that we verify someone who isn’t actually the candidate.”但這樣的情況還是發生了，而且這都沒牽涉到俄羅斯的宣傳機構或政治極端分子。這位高中生（因其年齡的關係並沒有在網絡上公開他的名字）告訴CNN，他覺得12月的假期太無聊了，於是在瞭解了俄羅斯干預2016年大選的信息之後，他想測試一下推特確保選舉完善性的舉措。But that’s exactly what’s happened—and it didn’t even involve Russia’s propaganda machine or political extremists. The high schooler, who the network didn’t name due to his age, told CNN that he was bored over the December holiday period and, after learning about Russian meddling in the 2016 elections, wanted to test Twitter’s election integrity efforts.那麼他是如何欺騙推特的呢？他花了20分鐘爲虛構的候選人創建了一個網站，然後又花了5分鐘爲他創建了一個推特賬戶。至於這位候選人的照片，這名少年從“此人不存在”網站上利用人工智能合成了一張照片。然後，這名少年在Ballotpedia（美國政治百科全書）網站上編輯了他虛構的候選人的相關信息。Ballotpedia網站旨在成爲美國政治候選人的在線百科全書。So how did he dupe Twitter? He took 20 minutes to create a website for the imaginary candidate, then another five minutes to make a Twitter account for him. For the candidate’s picture, the teen took an image created by artificial intelligence from the website This Person Does Not Exist. Then the teen had his fake candidate listed on Ballotpedia, a website that aims to be an online encyclopedia for American political candidates.這名少年告訴CNN，Ballotpedia並沒有要求他提供任何能證明國會候選人安德魯·沃爾茲真實存在的證據，而推特則與該網站合作“利用其專長來確認候選人的官方競選推特賬號”。之後，這位虛構的沃爾茲的賬戶就獲得了認證。The teen told CNN that Ballotpedia—with which Twitter partners “to utilize their expertise in identifying the official campaign Twitter accounts of candidates”—didn’t ask for any proof that Congressional candidate Andrew Walz actually existed. After that, the account for the fake Walz was verified.
