The Japanese Ministry of Finance (MOF) has asked Twitter – now known as X – to take down a fake account of top currency diplomat Masato Kanda.

In a pair of English-language posts on Twitter, the MOF said: “A Twitter impersonation account posing as Vice Minister Kanda Masato of the Ministry of Finance of Japan was confirmed. Twitter account owned by himself and his staff does not exist.

“Therefore, the impersonation account has nothing to do with both Mr. Kanda and MOF. Please don’t follow the impersonation account and/or comment on the post. MOF is currently requesting that X (formerly Twitter) suspends the impersonation account. Thank you for your cooperation.”

The account under Masato’s name was created in March and has made five posts to date, including one which appears to impersonate the diplomat’s recent trip of support to Ukraine. The account follows around 5,000 users and has over 500 followers. Despite fears that the account may further destabilise the already fragile Japanese Yen, it has made no posts about the financial markets.

Kanda has emerged as the central figure in Japan’s attempts to stem the decline of the Yen, and oversaw record yen-buying, dollar-selling operations in 2022.

The situation has echoes of the early days of Elon Musk’s ownership of Twitter following the introduction of the paid ‘Twitter Blue’ subscription. This allows users to pay to receive a blue tick against their account, a previously prestigious signifier to verify the legitimacy of official accounts. Many users however abused this system to impersonate celebrities and corporate accounts. One who pretended to be pharmaceutical firm Eli Lily cost the company billions when they tweeted that they were going to make insulin free.

Twitter this week rolled out an update for Twitter Blue users which allows them to hide their blue checkmark, after the scheme attracted derision.

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