Being a public figure with major influence also means getting used to being judged or even criticized by the public for improper behavior or questionable attitudes. However, that does not mean tolerating those who exploit freedom of speech and online anonymity to spread misinformation, slander, or defame artists on social media. Malicious words—no matter how easily typed from behind a screen—can still inflict deep harm on the people involved.

Online anonymity was originally designed to protect users’ privacy, but its downside is that many bad actors take advantage of it to attack artists, using the guise of “doing good” to sow hatred. This has long been one of the most difficult issues for fandoms, artists, and management companies to tackle.

Fortunately, a recent update on X (formerly Twitter) is believed by many fans to offer meaningful support in dealing with anonymous accounts that specialize in spreading harmful content. The feature quickly gained widespread attention, especially among ARMYs, as BTS are frequently targeted by malicious campaigns.

According to the latest update, X now publicly displays several basic but partly identifying pieces of user information, including date joined, account based in, username change, and connected via. These data points are shown publicly and cannot be edited or hidden, making it much harder for users to disguise their identity. 

Shortly after the feature rolled out, ARMYs indeed discovered several cases in which accounts had been using false identities to repeatedly attack BTS members. A notable example includes accounts such as @LandPalestine, @Raji, @nizar_almasre, @falastinarchive, and others—revealed to actually be “accounts based in Israel or the United States.”

These accounts had previously claimed to be Palestinians and to be speaking “on behalf of Palestine” while criticizing V. Some even leveled serious accusations at him, such as “supporting Zionists” or “supporting the war in Gaza,” merely because he is the brand ambαѕѕador for Coca-Cola Zero кσяєα. In reality, Coca-Cola кσяєα operates as an independent franchise that has no connection to Coca-Cola in the U.S. or Israel.

What makes this even more absurd is that these accounts used their criticism of V as a way to ‘raise funds to support Palestinians.’ Some of them collected tens of thousands of dollars under the label of being ‘Palestinian’ and gained attention by attacking BTS for using brands claimed to be on the BDS list — yet who would know if that so-called relief money ended up going somewhere else entirely, even to Israel.

A user confirmed to be a real Palestinian, @meikthvs, once defended V by saying: “As a Palestinian I can tell you that zionism isn't drinking coke and seeing how y'all are using the zio word for the most trivial reasons proves that y'all never actually cared about Palestine — it's just an excuse to spread hatred.” Yet this person also ended up becoming a target of those impersonators.

Why would people who are not actually Palestinian pretend to be Palestinian just to attack V or harαѕѕ fans who defended him? Clearly, what they aimed for was not peace in Gaza but rather the defamation of the idol. Under the guise of humanitarianism and justice, they found ways to gather more people into hating him. The act of impersonation for the purpose of slander has escalated into soмєтнing far more complex than most would imagine.

The positive side, however, is that thanks to X’s new policy, these impersonators were exposed, and their attempt to manufacture hatred toward BTS was brought to light, making it harder for the public to be manipulated. After ARMYs called them out, the accounts in question quickly deleted or deactivated their profiles within hours, showing they were forced into retreat in humiliation.

While these updates cannot completely eradicate slander on social media, they offer newfound hope to fans and artists alike—that anonymity can no longer be an impenetrable shield for harmful actions. As the situation became clearer, ARMYs voiced their thoughts:

- the losers that preached about boycotting were all from Israel and they are deactivating now lmao

- Some peeps r saying that it's because Isr**l occupies lands in Palestine, that's why it's showing isr**l here. Well, even if that was the case, why would they deactivate their account lol? Isn't it sus?

- That's f*cked up. What if the fund they collected went to Israel?

- Now, those real harαѕѕes are deactivating after all the drama they caused

- Lmao this sнιт is funny. Pretending to be humanitarian while stirring up hatred against someone who did nothing wrong — how ‘humanitarian’ of them

- why u guys should not take these losers seriously..never cared about the genocide theyre bitter stanaccs

- F*ck them. i've been seeing a lot of exposing happening for the past hours, i love it. they're disgusting! we*ponizing Palestine's situation to att*ck tae is so disgusting. DISGUSTING. & the fund they collected? ugh, f*ck these scam вιт¢нαѕѕes. LOSERS.

- All this time the hate tae got from this account is from Israel. Pathetic

- So they pretended to care while harαѕѕing armys and BTS. I always knew that boycotters were a joke. People that uses war to in another continent to attack innocent people living far away in another continent. Ddaeng

- Half the people of twitter telling fake stories and scam people so much