Phishing spam on Twitter

Dear Twitter,

You have done an incredible job of responding to a massive influx of new users, especially over the last 8 months.  With growth reaching 1400% month over month, the need to react and support quickly has been critical, and for the most part I would say you have done so better than just about anybody else has that has seen such rapid growth on their platforms.   With the recent roll out of Twitter lists you have also added value to the community by providing a tool that people can use to pull some signal out of all of the noise.  Many are finding the lists as the place to discover and follow new people.  Thank you for all of your work.

A new phenomenon has bubbled up from the user community, and it’s something that I would like you to take quick and decisive action on.  Phishing scams have torn through Twitter on an almost daily basis for the last several weeks, with unsuspecting users clicking links and turning over their credentials.  The results have been painful to deal with…I’m receiving dozens, and sometimes hundreds,of direct messages from real people (not bots) every single day with messages like, “hey. do this iq quiz for me http://quiz6545.info” and “i found y0u http://videos.twitter.shjjiwe.com/?vpgdzxiaq”. This is phishing that is perpetuating too rapidly and it’s starting to ruin the communication platform for me. Here is what needs to happen to fix this…

Earlier today I received a private message on Facebook from a personal friend of mine asking me to “Check 151.im”.  Knowing her and knowing the type of message, I immediately recognized it as a phishing scheme…that is, an attempt for me to voluntarily hand over personal information to a site that I think is something I regularly use.  Very often phishing schemes involve bank information, but in this case the website in question looks like the login page for Facebook.  Understand that it is not Facebook, it is an attempt to get your username and password!

Tweet and Retweet: A great way to share information with others

UPDATE:  I changed hosting companies since originally publishing this article, and ironically it removed the number of reweets from the plugin at the top of the post. You have to love technology sometimes!

One of the fastest and most effective ways of spreading information through Twitter is to retweet somebody.  When you see “RT” followed by a username in an update by one of your friends, that means they are retweeting somebody else…taking that person’s post and redistributing it to their own followers.  It’s rampant on Twitter, and one of the most common questions I get asked is, “what are some guidelines for retweeting, and how can I get retweeted more?”  I want to address both of those with some simple guidelines and suggestions.

How To Retweet

Retweeting somebody’s thoughts, links or pictures is the ultimate compliment on Twitter.  It says that you think enough of what they have written to share it with your followers, a pool of people that may be completely different than those of the original tweeter! It is a fantastic way to share information and ideas.  Of course you are free to retweet whatever you want, but here are some general guidelines that I think make it easier for you and those that follow you.

Do you want to know every little detail about your tweeting habits? There are a lot of services that show you a lot of information, but TwitterFriends really brings some useful data into the picture.  Not only can you see hard numbers about your frequency, replies, and how you compare to Scoble, you can actually look at your network of friends as it relates to others that you follow.  I think it’s fascinating.  My favorite part? The tab that shows me accounts that I follow that haven’t updated in a long time. I removed about 20 people that haven’t updated in months!

Instead of a full write up I made a quick video.  Check it out, it’s under three minutes.  Let me know if you find TwitterFriends useful!