#makeITsafePH: Are You Spamming on Social Media? You Might be Scaring Everybody Away!

Billions use social media every day and that number just keeps growing! 

In fact, this year, it is estimated that 2.62 billion people around the globe will be using these social networks, up from just around 1 million less than 10 years ago.

In the Philippines, according to Hootsuite and WeAreSocial's “Digital in 2018” social media and digital trends report, there are 67 million Filipinos using the Internet and around the same number are also active on social media. 

New Norm for the Digital Millennium 

Social media are websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking. It is internet-based and offers users easy electronic communication of personal information and other content, such as videos and photos.

And we use it everyday, in every part of our lives – in our personal relationships, in the workplace, in school,  for information and for entertainment, among others.

But businesses also see social media as valid advertising tools and users (such influencers, bloggers and “YouTubers”) have built careers out of sharing content. 

Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube are among the many social media sites are the platform of choice for many businesses, individuals and personal brands for it is easy, effective and less expensive to get their messages across. 

But like the most of the Internet, they have been misused and eventually gave rise to Social Media Spam — done by other users, advertisers and even ourselves!

Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. 

Spamming is flooding the Internet with many copies of the same message, in an attempt to force the message on people who would not otherwise choose to receive it. 

Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Spam. Efam. 

Before social media, spam was synonymous with junk emails. Now that email providers have stepped up their game against them, spammers have taken over social media! 

With fake accounts (BOTs) on hand, spammers attack social media in so many ways that you've probably encountered one just now. 

• BULK MESSAGING. Messages with the same or similar text can be sent out to a group of people in a short period of time. This is very evident on Twitter to make any a certain hashtag trend. Several spam accounts can also simultaneously post duplicate messages. 
  

• SPREADING MALICIOUS LINKS. Malicious links are links created with the intent to harm, mislead or damage a user or their device. When the link is clicked, activities triggered can range from downloading malware to stealing personal information. 
  

• FRAUDULENT REVIEWS. These are reviews from users that never actually used the product and are just paid for positive reviews to boost a product.
  

• CLICKBAITING. It is the act of posting a sensational headline to encourage the user to click through to the content with the aim of generating online advertising revenue. When the user clicks through to the page, the content usually doesn’t exist or is radically different from what the headline made it out to be.
  

• LIKEJACKING. This is the act of tricking users to post a Facebook status update for a certain site without the user’s prior knowledge or intent. This type of spam is explained in details via this link.
  

But not all spammers are using fake accounts. Sometimes, it’s a real/personal or their businesses accounts that do these things for the following reasons:

• To be discovered by potential new customers.
• To become seen as an authority.
• To build relationships with new and existing customers.
• To drive traffic to your website.
• To convert followers into paying customers.

And last but not the least, most likely you and I have done spamming without realizing it.

We have all experienced the app that will send spammy messages out to our friends on our behalf.  Ever tried playing Farmville before? 

And sometimes too many of your selfies posted on your social media in a short span of time  maybe considered spam!

#makeITsafePH with Globe: Avoid Being a Victim or a Spammer!

Because social media sites are such convenient platforms and being linked to an increasing number of applications on phones and other devices, it becomes even more necessary to secure them.

As a major purveyor of digital lifestyle for the Filipinos, Globe Telecom came out with the #makeITsafePH campaign to educate consumers about cybersecurity and cyberwellness. 

The campaign teaches the public proper online etiquette so that they can avoid becoming a victim or would not become a source of such deplorable behavior!

And it starts with us!

Let's not overdo soc-med posting or share content excessively. Our audience only needs to hear from us a certain number of times a day or even per week. And please, post something worthwhile!

Minimize tagging other persons on a certain post of yours especially if they have nothing to do with it. Surely they don’t want their soc-med to be billboards of product of yours. They will share it on their if they find it useful or just like it.

If you are an administrator of any pages you can visit the settings and choose your options. One highlight is to alter the setting and choose a default that makes post views “Only Post by Page”. This prevents users from posting links on your FB Page wall posts which oftentimes contain a lot of  spam. 

As a precaution to its users, Facebook also uses filters gray out comments that it  thinks contain spam as it continues to beef up anti-spam efforts every year through the use of automatic spam filters. 

To be safe from spam, keep these in mind 

1. Beware of short links that accompany text on your wall from people who don’t normally post links.
2. Investigate or research any app that seems too good to be true before agreeing to install it.
3. Pay attention to what apps you authorize to post to your wall.
4. Keep an eye out for popular scams and waves of attacks.
5. If you do fall victim to one of these app spam attacks, be sure to follow these instructions:

• Visit your Facebook privacy settings and click on the bottom section that says “Apps and Websites.”
• You will see a listing of the most recently accessed apps from your account, select the offending app and remove it from your account.
• Delete any messages posted by the app on your behalf and notify any friends that might have been spammed.

This is just an overview about how social media is affected by spam. Nonetheless, we all learned a thing or two about spamming and how to deal with it. Also, we now have an idea on how we might contributing, in some ways, to this problem.

Let us do our part in making social media safer and more enjoyable.  

Let's #makeITsafePH !

BONUS: Check out this cool infograph about Social Spam

References:

1 https://www.statista.com/statistics/278414/number-of-worldwide-social-network-users/

2 https://thenextweb.com/future-of-communications/2015/04/06/5-types-of-social-spam-and-how-to-prevent-them/

3 https://blog.markgrowth.com/social-spam-how-to-get-rid-of-it-how-to-not-social-spam-your-customers-a40f1a29311

4 https://blogs.constantcontact.com/social-spam-infographic/