Chaos enveloped Twitter after the social-media company discovered that the Elon Musk who had offered to buy it three weeks ago was actually a bot.
The bid for Twitter is believed to be the largest corporate takeover ever proposed by a bot, mergers-and-acquisitions experts say.
A visibly embarrassed Parag Agrawal, the C.E.O. of Twitter, explained to reporters how the company was persuaded that the Elon Musk bot was actually Elon Musk.
“The bot account had a blue check, indicating that it had been verified,” Agrawal said. “It now appears that the bot had somehow been given the blue check by another bot.”
The C.E.O. said that Twitter was conducting a “thorough internal review of procedures” to insure that it is not purchased by a bot in the future.
“The bot appeared to be an actual human being, which should’ve been our first clue that it wasn’t Elon,” he said.
