Twitter Scammers Get Serious

As the number of people using Twitter has grown so, off course, has the number of people using the system to try to take advantage of others. There have been a number of scams lately that have come to my attention.

Twitter power user and Facebook coach Mari Smith has been hounded recently by a Twitterer who sets up fake profiles pretending to be Mari and uses that forum to deride and poke fun of the coach. Each time Twitter identifies the offending Twitterer and closes down the profile but each time they simply set up a new fake profile and start from scratch. No doubt it has been really annoying for Mari, but she’s done a good job of using Twitter to bring these to the attention of her audience and therefore limit the impact.

Also in the news on the Twitter scam front comes the case of the Brazillian site which shares a porn link with Twitter contacts but when someone clicks, a nasty virus is downloaded which can access data on your machine. Maybe it serves them right for clicking on porn links in the first place but regardless, this is one of the first instances and no doubt not the last, of people using Twitter maliciously.

So Twitterers: beware and be safe when you microblog. Our next post…. You guessed it, safe Twittering. Watch this space.