Twitter has blocked thousands of accounts to see if y are controlled by social bots. This was reported by US media citing company. The exact number of blocked accounts was not known by service, but confirmed that “suspicious account activities” are currently being investigated. This includes automated publishing of tweets by social bots. In this context, several user accounts have been blocked and account holders have been asked to provide ir telephone numbers.
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“DieseÄnderungen are an important step to make sure that thatwe malicious activities that target WichtigenTwitter talks – including US and world elections – are one step ahead,” Twitter manager Yoel Roth shared with .
Twitter lasted in course of investigations by investigator Robert Mueller on Russian interference in US presidential election in criticism because of weak precautions against tampering – just like Facebook. Now that thousands of accounts are being reviewed, US president Donald Trump’s followers seem to feel particularly curtail about measure. Many complained because ir number of followers had fallen. Under hashtag TwitterLockOut y made air of ir annoyance.
The Washington Post also quoted a well-known right-wing blogger and conspiracy orist who wrote on his website: “Trump-people and conservatives generally have feeling that social media is being measured with double standards and feel through this Action confirmed. “
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Twitter is going to check accounts as follows: “If an account is blocked and user is asked to provide a phone number, account will be removed from follower counts until a phone number is given,” said a spokesperson for Company. This is part of “ongoing, comprehensive effort to make Twitter safer and healthier for everyone.”
In a radical step in fight against spam, Twitter also prohibits posting same contribution from multiple accounts at same time. Even technical possibility to do this is to disappear from apps.
Fake accounts to pretend high follower numbers
The company has been criticized for a long time, not to be strict enough against abuse. Twitter allowed anonymous user accounts and use of so-called bots, which automatically discontinue messages. Sending identical messages across multiple accounts, or retweeting or like multiple accounts at same time, can help to add topics to Twitter trend list and give a false impression of how widespread y actually are.
Twitter gives affected users until 23 March time before it wants to block accounts. An exception was made for bots of great interest as for earthquake warnings. Twitter also wants to act against furr violations of its terms of use, for example against fake accounts with which users pretend to have a high number of followers.
