Massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter

Re:Massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter by will_pseudonym on Friday January 27, 2017 @04:40PM (#13502934)

I wonder what proportion of the chattering class will pay attention to measures of retweet:follower ratios. It's a good proxy for a fake account.

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Re:Massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter by problems on Friday January 27, 2017 @04:45PM (#13502968)

Go over to google and put in the words "buy retweets". That's really not a problem. They have full control over the accounts (via either fake signups themselves or script kiddie iStealer means), so anything like that in demand enough is probably something you can buy.

A look at the history or content of mentions is probably the best bet to detect a faked account. Still, a clever person might slip by a cursory check.

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Re:Massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter by ryanSrich on Friday January 27, 2017 @06:39PM (#13503780)

Hell there are even Chrome plugins for free that'll get you followers, retweets and likes all automatically. Twitter is a joke. Anyone that takes their user count and interactions seriously on that platform is in for a bad time.

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Re:Massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter by andai on Friday January 27, 2017 @05:00PM (#13503083)

Can you buy retweets from accounts with human followers?

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Re:Massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter by problems on Friday January 27, 2017 @05:28PM (#13503314)

Yes, if you can get those stolen accounts rather than generated ones.

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