Twitter Inc (TWTR) Eliminates Fake Pro-China Accounts

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Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) understands the importance of prompt service and here is an example of its dedication to the needs of its customers. Bogus Twitter accounts caught the attention of the reporters at the New York Times and they highlighted the issue through an article that discussed the usage of Twitter accounts for spreading pro-China propaganda. Just hours after the article, Twitter reacted by pulling down several of the fake accounts.

Twitter taking instant action

A Tibetan advocacy group was the first to identify around 100 such accounts. Twitter took immediate actions and it seems a large number of suspicious accounts have already been put to an end. A number of Twitter accounts that were supporters of China’s contentious ethnic minority policies bearing odd names like Tom Hugo, Felix James, Alayna Newark and few more got suspended later in the night on Monday.

A thorough supervision of hundreds of Twitter accounts was made so as to find out the fake ones created for the said purpose. The Free Tibet organization identified about 100 accounts as the fake ones, which had few common traits for example – the photographs used were randomly downloaded from the internet, which belonged to the famous models, actors or the American high-school students and bore names that vaguely sounded Anglo-Saxon.

Several fake accounts still remain unidentified

Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) ‘s quick response to the Free Tibet’s request had left Alistair Currie, the media manager for Free Tibet very much contended and hence delighted. Currie suspects that many such fake accounts created for the said purpose could still be active of which, Ken Peters’ could be one. This person is a strong critic of Dalai Lama and has around 2000 followers. Another such account could be that of Shelley John, who has a liking for traditional Tibetan hair braiding, but not more than 20 followers.

Efforts to identify other fake accounts are being made by the organization, which would then instruct Twitter to delete, informs Mr. Currie.

“It looks like they took down the obvious ones that used two first names, but the bigger question is what action Twitter is going to take to prevent this from happening in the future,” Mr. Currie said in a telephone interview to NY Times.

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