Artificial intelligence has made it even easier to create deep fakes, and with social media bombarded with misinformation, LinkedIn is taking a different approach to verification, for CNBC.
“Now you see things like deep fake videos, photos that are increasingly difficult for the naked eye to tell if they're real or fake,” said Oscar Rodriguez, LinkedIn's vice president of trust and security. “This blurring of the line is what we believe poses a significant challenge in combating things like disinformation, fake expertise, and so on.”
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LinkedIn has been battling scammers posing for recruiters for years and has been working on his verification efforts for some time, for Axios.
The company launched its verification service in April 2023 and announced this week that it has verified more than 55 million users so far. That's more than any other social media platform, the company told CNBC.
However, unlike X and Meta, LinkedIn is verifying users for free. And it's not cheap. Rodriguez said the company has spent “a significant investment” in the process.
Users can be verified through their company email addresses at certain larger businesses. If your company isn't participating, users can be verified with a government-issued ID through verification partners Clear and Persona, with LinkedIn footing the bill.
LinkedIn's goal is to have 100 million verified users by 2025.
Microsoft bought LinkedIn in 2016 for 26.2 billion dollars.