At the end of the first quarter of 2022, the number of fake accounts on Twitter was less than five percent which is 11.3 million of its total number of users at 226 million, a report by Twitter shows.
Bots are automated accounts that can do the same things as real human beings, send out tweets, follow other users, like, and retweet postings by others. Spambots use these abilities to engage in potentially deceptive, harmful, or annoying activities.
Elon Musk, Tesla CEO, stated that he wanted to improve Twitter by defeating spambots and authenticating all humans by making greater use of security methods like reCAPTCHA to help crackdown on spambots.
Following the report, Musk announced on Friday, 13 May 2022, that he is putting his deal to buy Twitter ‘temporarily on hold’.
The company stated in the report, that estimation of false or spam accounts may not accurately represent the actual number of such accounts and could be higher than what it has stated.
Twitter wants to be a place where people can find authentic voices, which means one should be able to trust that the person or organisation featured in an account’s profile genuinely represents the account owner.
Read also: Elon Musk puts Twitter deal on hold
How to identify a fake account
Fake accounts are 0nline accounts that do not belong to genuine users, some are created for scamming, while others are for satirical reasons, as well as spreading fake news and misinformation.
In cases where Twitter suspects an account is misusing a specific individual or entity’s identity, more information will be needed in determining whether the account is run or authorized by the entity portrayed in the profile.
One of the main indications facing a fake account is the profile picture which is usually a feature of the user’s profile, a logo, brand image, or a person. Any image that doesn’t portray the content of the profile or has been taken from the internet should signal a suspicious alert.
The username or nickname can help find a fake account, if you notice a strange name such as a foreign name or a username with numbers, it may be fake especially since it is common that when a username is already taken the social network itself proposes a name with numbers.
The biography is a sector where users introduce themselves, describe what they do, and additional ways to contact. If you notice an uncompleted biography that has a suspicious link that can lead to places with probable viruses, then such an account is fake.
False accounts hardly have interaction with other accounts, you can recognise them from real accounts because many of them are related to spamming and their interactions are always the same.
According to Twitter, accounts that use deceptive identities can create confusion, as well as undermine the integrity of conversations on Twitter.
When confirmed an account is posing as one or one’s brand, the individual or brand’s authorised representative can file a report, or flag it as a bystander by reporting directly from the account profile.
Using a fake identity to disrupt the experience of others on Twitter in conjunction with other behaviours that violate the Twitter rules will result in strict enforcement actions.
While the consequences for violating the policy depend on the severity and type of violation, as well as an account history of a previous violation, violators may be required to edit the content on their profile.
In cases where such persists after the first warning, the account will be permanently suspended.
