Twitter shuts down fake Putin account with over 1M followers

The social network says Russian officials got in touch about the sham.

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Erin Carson

Nov. 29, 2018 7:10 a.m. PT

After six years in operation, a fake Twitter account for Russian President Vladimir Putin, with more than a million followers, got suspended by the social network.

Twitter tweeted Wednesday that it received information from Russian officials that the account was spurious, and that it suspended the sham account for violating the company's policy against impersonation.

We suspended @putinRF_eng for impersonation based on a valid report we received from Russian officials. Our impersonation policy can be found here: https://t.co/PIBC4nGI8H
— Twitter Comms (@TwitterComms) November 29, 2018

Twitter declined to comment further.

The account has been active since 2012. The BBC noted that even it had featured the account in news stories, believing it was real. The account didn't have a blue "verified" badge.