August 9, 2022

Ars Technica: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot

Ars Technica: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot. “Twitter yesterday slammed Elon Musk’s response to the company’s lawsuit in a 127-page filing in the Delaware Court of Chancery that says Musk’s claims are “contradicted by the evidence and common sense.” Twitter’s court filing also said Musk’s spam analysis relied on a tool that once called his own Twitter account a likely bot.”

Security & Legal Issues 0
August 6, 2022

Yale Insights: Is Elon Musk Right about the Bot Problem on Twitter?

Yale Insights: Is Elon Musk Right about the Bot Problem on Twitter?. “When he announced that he was buying Twitter, Elon Musk said his goals included ‘defeating the spam bots.’ Two months later, he withdrew his offer, claiming that the company had failed to make data on bots available to him. We asked Prof. Tauhid Zaman, who has studied the impact of bots, how much they skew the experience of Twitter users.”

Research & Opinion 0
August 1, 2022

NiemanLab: Two new bots can help newsrooms prioritize accessibility and alt text

NiemanLab: Two new bots can help newsrooms prioritize accessibility and alt text. “The Objective recently spoke with Patrick Garvin about his Accessibility Awareness and Alt Text Awareness Twitter bots that provide information on web accessibility and encourage the use of alt text, respectively. With more than a decade of experience in visual journalism, user experience, and front-end development, Garvin shares how prioritizing accessibility is possible for all newsroom employees, not just tech staff.”

Around the Search & Social Media World 0
July 30, 2022

Intel 471: How cybercriminals are using messaging apps to launch malware schemes

Intel 471: How cybercriminals are using messaging apps to launch malware schemes. ” Apps like Discord and Telegram have underlying elements that allow users to create and share programs or other types of content that’s used inside the platform. These programs, colloquially known as ‘bots,’ or other content allows for users to share media, play games, moderate channels, or any other automated task a developer can devise. Cybercriminals have figured out how to leverage this for their own begotten gains.”

Security & Legal Issues 0
July 27, 2022

Indiana University Bloomington: New social media tools help public assess viral posts, check for bots

Indiana University Bloomington: New social media tools help public assess viral posts, check for bots. “The Observatory on Social Media, or OSoMe, at Indiana University has launched three new or revamped no-cost research tools to give journalists, other researchers and the public a broad view of what’s happening on social media.” They’re very Twitter-oriented and look like a lot of fun.

New Resources 0
July 25, 2022

CNET: How An NFT Trader Lost $150K Trying to Troll Twitter Bots

CNET: How An NFT Trader Lost $150K Trying to Troll Twitter Bots. “Scams and frauds are ubiquitous in crypto, but sometimes the biggest losses are those people inflict upon themselves. On Wednesday, one NFT trader suffered a spectacular loss of 100 ether, or $150,000, because of a joke gone wrong.” It was a silly thing for them to do, but much respect to this person for 100% owning it.

Around the Search & Social Media World 0
July 23, 2022

Middle East Monitor: Russia using attractive women to spread propaganda in Arabic, study finds

Middle East Monitor: Russia using attractive women to spread propaganda in Arabic, study finds . “Autocrats, dictators and serial human rights abusers employ some of the most sophisticated techniques to execute their war propaganda, which in recent years has been waged through social media. The latest example of such disinformation campaign was uncovered by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) which uncovered Twitter accounts posting pro-Kremlin narratives in Arabic by using attractive female to increase their followers.”

Ukraine 0
July 20, 2022

WIRED: Instagram Slow to Tackle Bots Targeting Iranian Women’s Groups

WIRED: Instagram Slow to Tackle Bots Targeting Iranian Women’s Groups. “IRANIAN WOMEN’S RIGHTS groups have for months faced a deluge of bots following their Instagram accounts and disrupting their digital outreach operations. Activists say that while they have repeatedly asked Meta, Instagram’s parent company, to stymie the flood of junk followers, more keep coming, totaling in the millions across dozens of organizations operating in Iran and elsewhere around the world.”

Around the Search & Social Media World 0
July 19, 2022

Exclusive: Fake Accounts Fueled the ‘Snyder Cut’ Online Army (Rolling Stone)

Rolling Stone: Exclusive: Fake Accounts Fueled the ‘Snyder Cut’ Online Army. “For a time, rival studios and digital marketing executives were intrigued by the SnyderVerse fan mobilization, wondering how they, too, might better harness the power of social media. But soon many came to question what appeared to be suspect activity: Hashtags like #ReleaseTheSnyderCut saturated social media beginning in late 2019, racking up hundreds of thousands of tweets a day to pressure Warner Bros. to release the director’s version of the film.”

Around the Search & Social Media World 0
July 18, 2022

CBS News: Report finds online campaign of “widespread targeted harassment” against supporters of Amber Heard

CBS News: Report finds online campaign of “widespread targeted harassment” against supporters of Amber Heard. “[Ella] Dawson was one of many Heard supporters on the receiving end of an organized campaign of ‘widespread targeted harassment,’ according to a report published Monday by the research firm Bot Sentinel. The firm analyzed more than 14,000 tweets that included at least one of four viral anti-Heard hashtags seeking to characterize Heard as a liar or an abuser, and found that nearly 1 in 4 accounts tied to the tweets, 24.4%, were created in the last seven months.”

Security & Legal Issues 0
July 18, 2022

BBC: Firms ‘going to war’ against rivals on social media

BBC: Firms ‘going to war’ against rivals on social media. “A growing number of unscrupulous companies are using bots or fake accounts to run smear campaigns against their competitors on social media, it is claimed. That’s the warning from Lyric Jain, the chief executive of Logically, a high-tech monitoring firm that uses artificial intelligence (AI) software to trawl the likes of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok to find so called ‘fake news’ – disinformation and misinformation.”

Security & Legal Issues 0
July 16, 2022

Elon Musk’s Irony: Bots, the Impetus to Abandon His Twitter Deal, Have Propelled Tesla (NewsWise)

NewsWise: Elon Musk’s Irony: Bots, the Impetus to Abandon His Twitter Deal, Have Propelled Tesla. “Maryland Smith’s David A. Kirsch, who is researching pro-Tesla Twitter bots, or ‘fanbots,’ says irony pervades Elon Musk’s stated reasoning to abandon his $44 billion offer to buy Twitter. While the company has filed suit to enforce the deal, Musk says his decision is based on the platform’s traffic of bots, or fake accounts.”

Research & Opinion 0

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