Account Verification Tips For New Steemians (Trust But Verify)
When I joined steemit, I did not verify my identity.
As a new Steemian, I did not understand why it was important. Now I do. Everyone should be verifying themselves in one way or another. There are some good ways, and there are some bad ways. This post will explain the difference and give new people assistance verifying themselves.
Bad Ways to Verify
Who knew I was Donald Trump?! It is a ridiculous and funny thing, but this is the quality of verification images I often see from new people. No one should accept an image like it as a way to verify an account's identity. At least you made an attempt though, for many people never post any verification at all.
Hopefully, @cuteve won't mind me using her image as example to learn from. Her verify image is almost as bad as my fake one above. Someone could have easily taken the real person's image, added the small graphic, and passed it off as themselves.
Her account was verified through another way that I'll explain below. The image she used, by itself though, was not a good way to verify herself. She is a talented and attractive person too, so it is even more important for her to verify.
Good Ways to Verify
My Twitter account has some of my Steemit.com posts tweeted through it. That is an easy way to verify who I am. @cuteve had links to her Steemit account shared on her Facebook as another example. I also posted an image of my private investigator registration card. It is a government issued ID to prove that I have the credentials I say I have.
We don't need a picture of a government ID though. Definitely do not share an ID that has personal information such as a home address on it. My PI registration does not, so I did not mind sharing it. We just need a way to link your Steemit account to the rest of your online content.
Max Kaiser is on here, and he verified his account easily by mentioning it within one of his Russia Today show's episodes. Boom! We knew, without a doubt, that his account was the real deal. If you have a YouTube channel, podcast, or radio show, you could mention your account on Steemit there to verify in the same way.
Today I met Marcel while going through new user's introduction posts. His account name is @dutchlife, and he posted a photo of himself with Steemit graphics and the date with time behind him. It is an image that would be difficult to Photoshop and a good one to use for verification purposes!
He is the same as @cuteve and will bring a lot of value to the platform. Please check them both out!
Why Bother to Verify?
When you do not verify your account, people have no way of knowing it is really you. For all we know, you are a scammer. It happens way to often too. The scammer sees someone with valuable content online, and then they steal that content to profit from it here. The more valuable your content is therefore, the more important it is to verify your account.
By verifying your account, you will gain followers more quickly. All the replies to your introduction posts will suddenly no longer be bots! You'll be engaged by real people who want to get to know you. They will trust that you are who you say you are, and you'll get more upvotes because of that trust.
Everyone should verify themselves. There's nothing to lose by doing it and an awful lot to gain. I hope this post has helped clarify the issue, given you good ways to verify, and explained why it is important. If you have any questions about the verification process, please ask below. I'll gladly assist you!
I'm constantly encouraging people to verify by holding up an printed out piece of paper showing their username. It's not as bulletproof as mentioning your steemit username on YouTube, but not everyone has a YouTube.
I'm surprised you didn't show my #introduceyourself image as an example of how to do this!
These are nice and all, but... They can easily be faked with simple Photoshop skills. :)
To be honest, anything can be faked in photoshop with a skilled artist. I have created products for prototypes that even the company I created them for could not tell they were illustrations. @dutchlife's image could even be very easily be faked. My basic skills in under 3 minutes - can make it look half faked with a very low res image - but who uses low res??
Photoshop is easier to fake high res images, unfortunately. If entire environments can be faked in movies, you can bet almost any image used to verify could be faked. I hope none take this as a challenge.. [palms face]
I have seen people used PS edited images as verification because as a designer you can spot certain typeface easily (yea, there are tools for that!). I've seen people using a handwriting font and photoshop 😐
Photo needs to include social security numbers, age, weight, DOB, and blood type results signed by physician 😆 Ok....maybe not. It is tricky though for 'big names' that have imposters crawling out of the cracks. Like you say "never stop verifying".
Can't We All Just Steem Along?
What's the solution then? I see people suggesting photos with signs, but I definitely do not think that's a good idea. For people who have other accounts, I think linking back to the steemit account from them is the best, right? Maybe there's another way?
I guess the bottom line is that if you are already a famous person, verifying using other social media accounts to link back works. Then for anyone without those accounts, perhaps verifying isn't as big of a deal. They can get away with more easily faked verification options since not as much is at stake?
I'm not sure there is a full-proof solution to the photos other than scrutinizing them if they seem suspect. There are ways to tell if images have been manipulated, but not everyone is a forensics expert.
I think linking to a verified account is a great way to enhance verification. One or more accounts would have to be hacked in order to alter/manipulate that means of verification.
To overcome the "photoshop" argument, all I did (and I recommend everyone doing this) was to film myself writing my user name and date on a piece of paper, and then post it.
Yes, video is great! I recommend people skip straight to video for online dating for the same reasons.
That is pretty brilliant. Video & even Live Stream verification could be a great way to throw out doubt.
Great idea @ajvest
I like this
That's what I'm talkin about! 😎👍
Of all the T shirt designs I've created... I don't have a Steemit Tee.. That's going to happen..lol
Thanks for sharing, @tecnosgirl!
I do have to agree with @grow-pro, It is fairly simple to change the screens behind me. These are square shaped objects, easy to mask out of an image. Just remove my shoulder and place any desired image on the background. I like the idea of life streaming as a good validation check. Something else you see a lot, and I am not sure if steemit has this aswell, is sending verification to a phone number. Every account has 1 phone number attached. I also like the idea of linking other social media counts. However, if steemit grows and the other social media starts to being obsolete, this strategy falls short.
Where's the bong? If you're going to edit it, you might as well make it hilarious. haha
That's true! 😆
Where is my head today?!
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@finnian its good that you sharing this important lesson and To avoid misunderstandings !! that everyone will do it right :)) i happy you took me for example :D !! i resteem and upvote !!
Thank you ^ ^ and thanks for all the help :D !! happy to have you on steemit :D
Thanks for being so gracious! We're learning this thing together. haha You're very welcome, and I wish you continued success.
Great topic and really great discussion in these comments. I had not really thought about this topic, going back to check if I ever actually verified myself!
Thanks! I think we narrowed it down to making a video of yourself writing up your account name, etc. or linking back to the new steemit.com account using other social media accounts. Pictures, by themselves, are practically worthless. haha
I'm torn on the whole verification thing. One, I value my privacy. Two, I don't want to get sucked up into the meta-data collective beyond what I'm willing to share. Once it is on the internet, it is out of your control.
I write original stories and share them here, nowhere else. If that isn't good enough -- and cheetah hasn't been flagging me so they are truly original -- then I don't know what to tell you.
I can see how it would be useful for people pretending to be celebrities or riding the coat-tails of someone who has a following elsewhere on the net, but for me I'm fine with just posting text.
I'm also reticent about putting my details out on the net. It's interesting seeing how internet etiquette is evolving at this place. In general, there has been a trend IMO to be more circumspect with what you put out there online, and a lot of people, me included, are serious about privacy and the possibility of identity theft and/or putting yourself in potential danger. But here it seems as though the etiquette is to put it all out there. I'm not comfortable doing that, and I wonder if I'll suffer here because of that. To be clear, I'm not famous on social media, so I'm not sure why it should matter.
What you wrote is true though. No one is forcing anyone to verify. Quality content is still the key to a successful account whether they verify or not. It just depends on the person's objectives. Mine include being very public about my writings. I need to do that for specific reasons. Perhaps you don't. :)
Well written and informative. Thank you for posting this. Steem On! :)
Thank you! Your feedback is very appreciated. 8-)
Has anyone else covered this topic in detail yet that has had it distributed? It probably has already been covered perhaps. I definitely think it is a worthy subject for us Steemians to discuss! We want quality people here, not people pretending to be quality people. ;-)
I'd like to see more use of encryption to verify accounts. I just posted about Keybase that could help with this. It's just something I'm into
That would certainly secure things well! The images by themselves are pretty useless, but links from other accounts back to the Steemit account is pretty solid without having to use encryption. :)
Yes, people should at least verify from other accounts. I've seen some pretty bad attempts at impersonation, but some people won't bother to check.
As a PI I cannot help it. It's fun to me to look into people's accounts and verify them for myself. @cuteve can tell you about it. I was pestering her. LOL
I have seen some lazy attempts as well, @steevc. Using a stock image of a person holding a paper - with the watermark still on it and their name photoshopped in with a handwriting font..😕 and to think...All that "effort" could've been used for good.
I've seen stock photos that are obviously that of models too. Who are they kidding? haha Hey, I'm John Smith, look at my sexy body!!! ::shows an image of a dude from a muscle magazine::
Haha, yes...exactly! and some creative stuff like (image found at pexels.com)
That Font is Sketch Rockwell - Spotted this in a single search query. It's abundant.
😉 It's everywhere. I see it. Never fooled, but I love the effort.
I do not want expose myself because I’m very shy person Isn’t my content saying for itself? English is my second language and I do not think that my way of writing will not prove that I am real person
Thanks for your comment! It helps. You don't have to verify. No one needs to add a blurb within their profile to introduce their interests. They don't have to add a profile picture either. All of those things help you though. What are your interests? I didn't see your intro post and have not met you until now. I'll follow you to find out more though! :)
Thank you, I'll do intro soon.
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Thanks, never really even thought about it before. I have a different name on youtube, would probably be a very good idea for me to cross-verify.
It is very important and helps an account here a great deal. It's way too easy for someone to take over someone's identity, use their content, and profit from it here. /cringe
Good tips. Thank you
You're very welcome!