Meta, the well-known American technology company, has reportedly planned to pilot a new subscription plan called Meta Verified, which would allow Facebook and Instagram members to pay to have their accounts confirmed.

As per Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, testing will start this week in Australia and New Zealand before expanding to other nations.

Meta will validate an account by employing a user's government-issued identification and issue them a blue badge for $11.99 a month on the web or $14.99 per month on iOS and Android.

Apparently, the blue badges from Meta were formerly exclusively offered to recognized users or businesses.

Meta Verified will be implemented in the United States and other nations after New Zealand and Australia.

According to the organization, subscribers will benefit from increased visibility, additional protection against identity theft, unfettered access to customer service, as well as a badge showing their account has been authorized with a government ID.

It went on to say that the paid service would be predominantly geared at content creators wishing to grow their visibility on the platforms whilst witnessing probable changes after a test period.

The company claimed that there would not be any changes to verified profiles on Instagram and Facebook and that only individuals over the age of 18 would be able to subscribe.

Businesses are not currently able to use the service.

According to sources, Zuckerberg's pricing plans for Meta Verified were not immediately evident in nations where people cannot afford to shell out $12 a month or in cash-based countries with fewer options for sending the money to Meta.

Elon Musk's previous attempts to introduce a similar service at Twitter last year were unsuccessful due to an embarrassing wave of bogus accounts that alarmed advertisers and raised concerns about the site's viability. To that end, Musk had to temporarily halt the action before resuming it in December to a muted response.

Source credit: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/2/20/facebook-owner-meta-to-roll-out-paid-subscription