Personally, I think the current implementation I’ve seen itch using for the “Verified” badge is good enough for now. But yeah, as a software company owner myself who is still working to get my own company off the ground – its harder than most people think to start a business tbh… unless you have a ton of money to throw at the goal of starting a business – I do agree that trust between merchant and customer is an absolute requirement if a company wants to survive.
To use an active asset creator from this very platform as an example for why the current implementation is fine “for now” (as I mentioned at the start) – take a look at Kenney. Kenney is a very prominent asset creator in the indie game dev scene and there have been imposters who have tried to resell Kenney’s assets by impersonating him. The Verified badge is currently not something that WE can simply apply for and it currently serves as a manually added indicator the itch admins use to prevent such imposters from impersonating notable merchants – which impersonating a merchant is a 100% completely inexcusable for anyone to do since that is a malicious act that requires premeditated volition which means these malicious imposters know full well what they’re doing is illegal and malicious and yet they still do it.
My honest thoughts about people impersonating well-known merchants in this way…
I’ll be honest, if someone tried to impersonate me or my company, I wouldn’t hesitate to use my investigative skills to hunt them down and ensure they face the judicial system’s full wrath. I have ZERO tolerance for that kinda malicious behavior and I WILL destroy any scumbag who attempts it towards my company or myself.
NOTICE: The last section of this post is a warning to those who have been doing that type of act. Tread carefully!