SAN FRANCISCO:
Twitter filed a lawsuit on
Thursday in a US court
against five websites that
it accuses of creating tools
for spamming, as the social media firm battles a
wave of automated tweets
barraging real users with
anything from Viagra ads
to virus-ridden links. Often billed as a service to
help a Twitter account
gain followers, websites
can take control of an
account, known as a bot,
that follows or sends automated tweets at real
users in the hope that some
will follow the bot back or
click through links the bot
has sent out. “As our engineers continue
to combat spammers with
strong safeguards and
technical efforts, today
we’re adding another
weapon to our arsenal: the law,” Twitter said in a blog
post. Twitter now claims 140
million active users. As its
user base has grown, so
have bots and spam,
emerging as a problem
that Twitter fears could dilute the online
conversation and irk bona
fide users. Litigation isn’t a novel
approach: both Facebook
and Google have taken
spammers to court in
recent years with success. The defendants listed in
the suit filed in the US
Federal Court in San
Franciso are
TweetAttacks,
TweetAdder, TweetBuddy, James
Lucero of justinlover.info
and Garland E Harris of
troption.com. The defendants could not
immediately be reached
for comment by Reuters. “We’ve focused on tool
providers; They have
willfully created tools that
enable others to propagate
spam on Twitter,” Twitter
said. “With this suit, we’re going
straight to the source. By
shutting down tool
providers, we will prevent
other spammers from
having these services at their disposal. Further, we
hope the suit acts as a
deterrent to other
spammers, demonstrating
the strength of our
commitment to keep them off Twitter.” In its blog post, Twitter
noted its recent acquisition
of Dasient, a web security
company that Twitter says
represents a part of its
“larger investment in security and fraud
protection.”
source: Times Of India
Tech News by Shariq Kazi 