X Is Finally Cracking Down on Unlabeled Ads

For years, X (formerly Twitter) has been a playground for undisclosed promotions, coordinated spam networks, and “native” advertising that masquerades as organic content. But that era appears to be ending — fast. The platform is now waging an aggressive, self-initiated war on unlabeled ads, and the person leading the charge is none other than Head of Product Nikita Bier.

on April 16, Nikita publicly called out Perplexity AI founder Arav Srinivas, demanding he “stop the undisclosed promotion campaigns” that were deceiving users and damaging the company’s integrity. The latest crackdown has been swift and highly visible.

First, the main Higgsfield account was banned. Then, on April 16, Nikita publicly called out Perplexity AI founder Arav Srinivas, demanding he “stop the undisclosed promotion campaigns” that were deceiving users and damaging the company’s integrity.

In a pointed reply, Bier quoted a thread exposing how Perplexity was allegedly fueling coordinated, unlabeled promo pushes across dozens of accounts.

Just hours earlier, a major account known as Zoomer (also referred to as Doomerzoomer or @doomerzoomer) was banned.

The account had been running a Telegram-coordinated UGC (user-generated content) campaign pushing undisclosed promotions for AI and crypto projects.

the same Zoomer account had received a $10,000 bonus directly from X’s content monetization program — for a meme post that was simply a screenshot of Steve Jobs’ daughter Eve Jobs with the caption “Steve Jobs daughter btw.” According to an explosive thread by @goddek, the operator — identified as Ben S. from New Zealand — was allegedly managing a network of ~150 big accounts, charging $500–$2,000 per post and taking a fat cut as the middleman.

The irony? Six months earlier, the same Zoomer account had received a $10,000 bonus directly from X’s content monetization program — for a meme post that was simply a screenshot of Steve Jobs’ daughter Eve Jobs with the caption “Steve Jobs daughter btw.”

The post went mega-viral (over 100 million views), but the creator complained about the initial low payout. A $10K bonus arrived within two hours.

Now that same account is gone for the exact opposite reason: helping brands run hidden ad campaigns.

X is also targeting the big news-aggregator accounts — think Dexerto, Daily Loud, and similar outlets — that flood the platform with repackaged, non-unique content scraped from TikTok, YouTube, Instagram Reels, and elsewhere But the purge doesn’t stop at individual influencers. X is also targeting the big news-aggregator accounts — think Dexerto, Daily Loud, and similar outlets — that flood the platform with repackaged, non-unique content scraped from TikTok, YouTube, Instagram Reels, and elsewhere. Nikita Bier has signaled that payouts for such accounts will be slashed. The message is clear: if you’re not creating original value, you’re not getting paid.

According to Bier, X now has a dedicated internal team focused exclusively on identifying and shutting down these loopholes. On his own timeline he’s openly admitted he gets a kick out of hunting down the spammers and algorithm abusers who’ve been gaming the system. For the first time in the platform’s history, this isn’t a reaction to pressure from the FTC or regulators — it’s X cleaning house on its own terms.

BAN HAMMER This is a notable shift. While other platforms have long tolerated (or even encouraged) gray-area “native” advertising, X under Bier’s product leadership is drawing a hard line: disclose it or lose it.

And if you want to see what real platform-level change could look like, just imagine if Pavel Durov had applied the same energy to Telegram instead of focusing on crypto. The sprawling networks of Russian, Indian, and Middle Eastern Telegram channels that endlessly rewrite the same posts, steal content from small creators, and survive entirely on undisclosed “native” ads would have been wiped out years ago. Instead, they continue to thrive — while X is choosing the harder, cleaner path.

Whether this crackdown sticks or becomes yet another temporary purge remains to be seen. But one thing is certain: the days of getting rich quietly shilling products through coordinated, unlabeled meme armies are rapidly coming to an end on X.

Nikita Bier isn’t just enforcing the rules. He’s enjoying the hunt. And right now, the spammers are on the run.

X Is Finally Cracking Down on Unlabeled Ads — And It’s Personal