The government of Norway on Tuesday, December 13, mocked Twitter for mistakingly labelling them as an organisation representing Nigeria.
The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs shared a screenshot of its own Twitter profile to call attention to the “Nigerian government organisation” label that the social media giant had placed on it.
“Dear @TwitterSupport, as much as we enjoy our excellent bilateral relations and close alphabetical vicinity with Nigeria, we would much appreciate if you could label us as Norway. P.S. That also goes for Prime Minister @jonasgahrstore and Foreign Minister @AHuitfeldt”, the Norway govt tweeted adding a wink emoji.
Dear @TwitterSupport, as much as we enjoy our excellent bilateral relations and close alphabetical vicinity with Nigeria, we would much appreciate if you could label us as Norway😉
— Norway MFA (@NorwayMFA) December 13, 2022
P.S. That also goes for Prime Minister @jonasgahrstore and Foreign Minister @AHuitfeldt 🇳🇴 pic.twitter.com/wr6cb3yv2W
The Twitter handle pointed out how Twitter had mistakenly affixed the same label to the official Twitter handles of the Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre and the country’s Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt.
As rightly pointed out, in an apparent mix-up between the two countries’ names, the Twitter profiles of both the Norwegian PM and FM are also tagged as representing Nigeria.
As seen in the aforementioned screenshots, there is a small grey flag followed by a description below the name and the Twitter handle of the relevant Twitter accounts on their profile page. In the year 2020, Twitter introduced these labels for accounts and tweets tied to government officials and “state-affiliated media”.
Labels on state-affiliated accounts provide additional context about accounts that are controlled by certain official representatives of governments, state-affiliated media entities, and individuals closely associated with those entities.
The label can be seen on the appropriate Twitter account’s profile page, as well as on tweets that are posted from that account. Labels specify the country with which the account is associated, as well as clarify if it is run by an official representative of the government or a state-run media organisation.
Additionally, these labels include a small icon of a flag to signal the account’s status as a government account.
For instance, if we look at Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Twitter profile, the social media giant has given him the label of “India government official,” which adds more context to the account.
The social media juggernaut, however, misidentified the Twitter accounts of both the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and high-ranking government officials, giving the Norwegian government the chance to troll them.
