Obama had 104 million followers before Twitter began removing fake accounts

Former President Obama has been caught with over 2 million fake Twitter followers as the platform implemented a mass purge of fake accounts from high profile users.

Obama had 104 million followers before Twitter began removing fraudulent or fake accounts from the platform, he now has 101 million as of Thursday evening according to The Hill.

According to Twitter, tens of millions fo accounts will be removed in the cull, which will see the platform lose just over 6% of its user base.

Locked accounts are now restricted from posting when it detects suspicious activity such as ‘mass Tweeting’ of unsolicited replies or mentions, and also must be verified by owners before the account can be unlocked.

According to The DailyCaller: The firm said the removal of locked accounts – believed to number in the millions – is part of effort to “improve the health” of conversation on the platform by deleting suspicious and inactive accounts.

Still, the former president trails only Katy Perry and Justin Bieber on the platform, and the three boast the only accounts to have over 100 million followers.

President Trump reportedly had 53.4 million Twitter followers before the Twitter purge and has lost around 300,000 for a Thursday evening follower count of 53.1 million. Trump remains the 18th most-followed person on Twitter.

Katy Perry and Obama lost more than 2 million followers overnight thanks to a new Twitter rule https://t.co/RcFLrs5Olz

— Business Insider (@businessinsider) July 13, 2018

On Wednesday, Twitter announced its intention to remove “locked accounts” from follower counts in order to “build trust and encourage healthy conversation on Twitter.” 

The drop in Twitter followers came after the platform formally announced on Wednesday that it would begin the process of removing “locked accounts” from follower counts in an effort “to build trust and encourage healthy conversation on Twitter.”

“Most people will see a change of four followers or fewer; others with larger follower counts will experience a more significant drop,” Twitter announced.

“We understand this may be hard for some, but we believe accuracy and transparency make Twitter a more trusted service for public conversation.”

The worst may be over for both Obama and Trump. The social media platform states that the “most significant changes” will happen over the next few days.