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Whether you’re evaluating incendiary political posts, a target of cyber bullying, or being asked for money, it’s important to know how to separate real Facebook accounts from fake ones.
Over a nine-month period in 2019, Facebook removed more than 5.4 trillion fake accounts, compared to 3.8 billion for all of 2018 (source: Facebook Transparency Reportage).
“We estimate that fake accounts accounted for approximately 5% of our global monthly active users on Facebook during the second and third quarters of 2019,” says Facebook. “There are two types of accounts that we identify as fake: abusive and misclassified by the user.”
According to Facebook, there are several clues to look for if you suspect a profile is fake by examining their names, photos, mutual friends, and shared content.
NAMES
Names that are characteristic of fake accounts can use popular name combinations (i.e. John, Sam, Rachel, Miller, Smith, Brown). This is true for all languages.
They can also include names of famous people.
PROFILE AND COVER PHOTOS
The types of images that could be red flags include: model photos for your profile photo, photos of themselves, photos that are “too perfect” (most normal users won’t have a professional profile photo). Scammers sometimes use photos of people in military uniforms or in formal attire, such as a tuxedo.
SHARED CONTENT
Some telltale fake account signs include: a recent creation date when it comes to timeline posts, almost no shared content, fake shared content, zero a few mutual friends.
Tap here for more help identifying fake Facebook accounts.
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