X just dropped a digital bombshell that’s peeling back the curtain on online fakery with a new location-revealing feature.
Launched on Friday, November 21, 2025, this update on Elon Musk’s social media platform lets users peek at the real country or region behind any account, exposing a slew of popular profiles pretending to be American patriots or Gaza journalists while operating from far-flung places, Fox News reported.
This isn’t just a tech tweak; it’s a wake-up call for anyone scrolling through political hot takes or war zone dispatches on X.
Take the account @1776General_, boasting over 140,000 followers and a bio dripping with stars-and-stripes pride as a “constitutionalist, patriot, and ethnically American.”
X’s new tool, however, pins this supposed defender of the red, white, and blue as operating out of Turkey—a far cry from the heartland.
The account owner’s excuse? “I work in international business. I'm currently working in Turkey on a contract,” they claimed, as if a temporary gig explains a full-blown identity mismatch.
Then there’s @AmericanVoice__, which had over 200,000 followers before the update revealed its base in South Asia, nowhere near the U.S. it claimed to represent.
Rather than face the music, the account’s owners pulled a vanishing act, deleting their profile faster than you can say “catfish.”
It’s a stark reminder that in the Wild West of social media, some folks are more interested in crafting a narrative than standing by the truth.
The location feature doesn’t just target American-themed accounts; it’s also shining a light on profiles claiming to report from Gaza amid ongoing conflict coverage.
For instance, @AbujomaaGaza, run by Motasm A. Dalloul, markets itself as a “Gaza-based journalist” with nearly 200,000 followers, yet X pegs its location as Poland.
Dalloul posted a video the next day, on Saturday, November 22, 2025, seemingly showing him in Gaza, though skeptics online are buzzing about whether it’s been digitally doctored.
Similarly, @QudsNen, which calls itself the “largest independent Palestinian youth news network” with over 600,000 followers, lists “Palestine” as its home but is flagged by X as operating from Egypt.
Even @Timesofgaza, with nearly a million followers and a mission to report from “occupied Palestine,” gets tagged with a location in “East Asia and the Pacific,” raising eyebrows about who’s really behind the keyboard.
Not all accounts face such discrepancies—X lists journalist Mariam Barghouti’s profile as based in “Palestine,” aligning with her stated identity, which shows the tool isn’t a blanket gotcha machine.
X’s head of product, Nikita Bier, defended the feature, saying, “When you read content on X, you should be able to verify its authenticity.”
While Bier’s point about transparency hits the mark for those of us tired of progressive agendas or foreign meddling masquerading as grassroots voices, X admits the tool isn’t foolproof—VPNs can still mask true locations, though a warning label flags potential trickery.
In a world where misinformation spreads faster than wildfire, this feature is a step toward accountability, even if it’s not a silver bullet against digital deception.
