Massive Networks Of Fake Accounts Found On Twitter

New research has found a massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter. The largest network ties together more than 350,000 accounts and further work suggests others may be even bigger. Tim Helming, Director, Product Management at DomainTools commented below.

Tim Helming, Director, Product Management at DomainTools:

“Because it is relatively simple to robo-create Twitter accounts, it’s not surprising to see the high numbers of bogus accounts, nor that they are being used for nefarious purposes. In 2016 we saw at least one botnet whose command and control used fake Twitter accounts. In 2017 I expect that we’re going to see a rise in this kind of activity, barring a change that makes it harder to register such accounts at large scale. A network like Twitter is great for humans, but unfortunately it’s also great for bots, since unlike a domain or IP address, you can’t just take Twitter down when it’s being used by a bot.”