Today Twitter announced upgrades to their spam fighting services – you will now see the text “report [username] for spam” under the actions you can take when viewing a users account.
This is a new method for contacting the Spam team at twitter… Previously you would have to follow the @spam account (they would follow back) and you could send them a direct message in the format “d spam @username”. This would trigger an investigation by the Twitter team. This feature also adds the Block user function and will prevent the account from following or replying to you in the future.
See what Twitter considers to be abusive and worthy of a “report spam” click.
What is spam?
- “Spamming” can describe a variety of different behaviors. Here are some common tactics that spam accounts often use:
- Posting harmful links (including links to phishing or malware sites)
- Abusing the @reply function to post unwanted messages to users
- Creating lots of accounts or using automated tools to create multiple accounts
- Spamming trending topics to try to grab attention
- Repeatedly posting duplicate updates
- Posting links with unrelated tweets
- Aggressive following behavior (for instance, mass following and un-following in order to gain attention)
Great upgrade for Twitter, now lets hope it’s not as redily abused as the “Report spam” button at many ISPs.
* Image thanks to Twitter
