Where it is mentioned that forum staff can whitelist you but there are no criteria was mentioned for that so it all depends but not sure it happened or not.
Whitelist is not a gift for everyone.
It is opened for every one but there are some criteria. Just my guess
- You can get acceptance if you are good member.
- You can get acceptance if you are a good member and send Whitelisting request for your alts. Alts can be accounts for your bots, data scraping, etc.
For plain newbie accounts, I don't think admins or global moderators will accept their Whitelisting request.
Notes- Whitelisting is only one time for lifespan of one account.
- If you are Whitelisted when you are a Full member, you can not get acceptance for Whitelisting again (your second time) when you rank up to Hero member, ie. or any higher rank than Full member.