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Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, is launching a new subscription service called Meta Verified.
The new service was announced in a Facebook post by Meta's Chief Executive Officer, Mark Zuckerberg.
Those who subscribe for Meta Verified will receive a verified badge for their accounts confirming that their account has been authenticated with a government ID.
They will also get more protection against impersonation with "proactive account monitoring", as well as direct access to customer support for "common account issues".
These new features aim to increase authenticity and security across Meta services, Zuckerberg said.
The paid service will also increase the account's visibility and reach, particularly in the search results, comments and recommendations, a Meta press release wrote.
However, Meta noted this depends on the subscriber's existing audience size and content.
"Subscribers with a smaller following may see a more noticeable impact to their reach since their audiences are smaller," it wrote.
Using government identification will help Meta to effectively find and remove any imposter account as they would know which account is the "real you", Zuckerberg said in the comments.
Users can purchase a monthly subscription for USD$11.99 (S$16.03) on the web and USD$14.99 (S$20.04).
According to the press release, Meta Verified will be available for direct purchase on Instagram or Facebook later in the week for Australia and New Zealand.
There will be no changes for accounts previously verified on Instagram and Facebook.
Businesses are also not eligible to apply for Meta Verified at this time.
In addition, those who subscribe to Meta Verified will be offered exclusive stickers on Facebook, Instagram Stories, and Facebook Reels.
Meta Verified will only support the user's real name on their profile once verified. Therefore, users cannot change their profile name, username, date of birth and profile picture without going through the whole verification application process again.
Not the first social media to offer subscription services
Meta is not the first company to implement a subscription model for verification.
Under Elon Musk's stewardship, Twitter launched Twitter Blue, a paid subscription that adds the blue checkmark to users' accounts.
For Twitter Blue, prices start at USD$8 (S$10.69) a month or USD$84 (S$112.29) a year.
Top photos via Zuckerberg's Facebook and Canva