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The Daily Mail erroneously claimed an iPhone 4 recall was underway, apparently quoting from a "ceoSteveJobs" twitter account.
The story, which has since been removed, quoted from the twitter update "We may have to recall the new iPhone, this I did not expect" despite the twitter account being clearly marked "Of course this is a parody account" in the profile.
Examination of previous parody tweets ought to have raised alarm bells at the red top news desk such as "To prevent signal problems with the new iPhone, avoid touching the phone at all times," in obvious parody of the reception problems cited in the last few days.
This hasn’t been the first time that the press has been duped by fake twitter updates which lead to twitter initiating a verified accounts system for important companies and personalities. Participating in the scheme results in a verified badge placed on the twitter profile page.
However it seems likely that journalists will continue to hunt for stories from the murky quasi-official world of decidedly non-verified employee twitter posts. However using a twitter purporting to be from a company CEO as the sole source of a story must surely be a strong indication of a lack of due diligence in the news gathering process.
