Japan warns Elon Musk, X to stop fake accounts from impersonating govt officials on the platform

Japan’s finance ministry has issued a statement, warning Elon Musk-backed X, which was formerly known as Twitter, to remove an account that was impersonating Masato Kanda, a highly positioned minister in Japan’s financial ministry.

Normally, the Ministry makes most of its announcements in English. However, in this instance, the ministry made the statement in English on the platform. This was a very rare thing to do for the Japanese government and goes on to show the gravity of the situation, and that they mean business.

The statement made by the Japanese government department requested users not to engage with the impersonation account. Kanda plays a crucial role in Japan’s efforts to stabilize the yen’s value, making his public comments influential in currency markets.

Evidently, the fake or impersonated account was posting stuff that was detrimental to Kanda both on a personal level, and made it a lot more difficult for him to carry out his tasks.

The fake account, which had approximately 550 followers, has now been suspended.

Kanda’s statements can significantly impact the yen’s value against other major currencies. According to Reuters, the impersonation account had not made any comments related to the yen or financial markets. It had only posted five times, with the most recent one trying to impersonate Mr. Kanda’s supposed trip to Ukraine.

The finance ministry confirmed the existence of the impersonation account and is currently urging X to suspend it. On Friday, X displayed a notice stating that the account had been suspended for violating “Twitter Rules.”