Introduced in July, 2010, TwitSweeper’s new feature has reviewed over one million shortened links to detect spam,  malware or phishing sites. “We see this as a growing problem”, states Doug Braun, President of Emerge2 Digital.  “To date, this new feature has already flagged over 1,900 bad links, with more to come.”

According to Dasient, over 1.3 million web sites host malware, usually without their knowledge and often due to third-party widgets, advertising or applications on their websites being hacked.

“As we all know, where spammers see an opportunity to make money or disrupt commerce, they’ll take advantage of it.” Fortunately, TwitSweeper is slamming the door shut on Twitter malware and spam.

TwitSweeper blocks Malware and Spam with new tool is a post from The Dustpan - Discussing Twitter Spam

Here’s the issue. Our stats don’t support this assertion.

In fact, our numbers suggest that spammers are alive and well on Twitter. How do we arrive at this conclusion? In December of 2009 we launched TwitSweeper. Its only function is to detect undesirable followers (spam and spammers), identify them, and list them so TwitSweeper users can choose to remove and block them. It does this very well.

Here’s what we know.

To date TwitSweeper has checked more than 1.7 million followers. It has detected and flagged more than 83,000 followers as being spam or spammers. This suggests that almost 5% of all the followers we’ve checked are spammy.

The next question is: What is Spam?

The universal answer seems to be: “Everything I don’t want to receive from someone I don’t know.”

The problem with this definition is that it can include everything. Promoting body enhancement products is a nuisance to most, but a blessing to some. One man’s garbage is another man’s gold.

Is Twitter doing a good job going after spammers? I’m sure they are making best efforts. Are they winning the battle? It’s too early to say. Do they have spam down to 1%? Our stats certainly don’t confirm that. If our stats indicate that 5% of followers are spammers, you’ve got to know the actual number is even higher.

Conclusion: As TwitSweeper’s Spam Detection Methodology continues to improve, we see a corresponding rise in spammy followers that are found. This suggests there are more spammers out there. Whereas, Twitter’s reported 1% spam figure is merely the portion of spam that they happen to have found so far.

In the end, everyone’s objective should be to keep the Twitter ecosystem clean of spam. But we aren’t there yet.

Is Twitter Winning the War on Spam? Our Stats Do Not Support this Assertion is a post from The Dustpan - Discussing Twitter Spam

There’s no question Twitter will be used by business and corporations to get their brand message out to consumers, that’s to be expected. Dell and others are doing this very effectively right now. However, as Twitter puts it, “Twitter is what you make of it – receive a lot of information or just a tiny bit…from breaking world news to updates from friends.”

Look at the stats posted in Main by Pingdom:

• 247 billion emails on average every day
• 1.4 billion email users worldwide
• Approximately 81% of emails sent are spam

How does that compare to Twitter?

• Estimated 27.3 million tweets on Twitter per day for the month of November 2009 (Pingdom)
• RJMetrics estimates 12 to 13 million active (monthly) users at the end of 2009
• TwitSweeper stats confirm Twitter spammy followers are over 4% and growing

How big Twitter’s is going to become is anyone’s guess, but I do know we have to stop Twitter spam before it reaches email proportions.

Lots of Spam potential on Twitter (unless we stop it) is a post from The Dustpan - Discussing Twitter Spam

Password

This is simple… make sure you have a good password, and an independent password – use a different password for Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, gmail (I know it’s hard). If you use a common password for all of them, just think of the problems if someone discovered that 1 password (they would have access to your entire web life). So make sure you protect yourself with a solid and separate password.

Report to Spam

You used to use the @spam twitter function, but Twitter just recently added a Report to Spam function which makes that all that much easier. When on targeted spammers profile page – there is a report to spam link.

TwitSweeper

Use TwitSweeper (shameless plug?) – We developed the app for a reason (to automatically get rid of your spammy followers on an ongoing basis).

Say no to Spam Topics

Stay away from spam topics… the more you mention spam related topics – the more attention you will bring to your account – and this is the wrong type of attention. There are applications out there that search for spam and then connect spammers together – it’s an easy way to get their numbers up.

Don’t use Automated Programs

“Receive 10,000 followers in one day, just click here”, Sure that sounds great, but you need to be realistic, it’s not going to happen that easy. Again you can purchase programs that will follow a whole whack of people in hopes that they follow you. Remember Twitter is a communication tool – keep it personable, tweet good content, you might not get as many followers, but you will appreciate the quantity of your followers.

Don’t follow Spammers

1. Before you choose to follow someone – check their name – does it feel like it was automatically generated – ie. JohnSmith101
2. Bio – Usually Twitter Spammer’s include some spam messages in their bio ie. Make money online fast.
3. Tweets – Look at their 10 most recent tweets – is it spam, is there useful content there. – If you see any mention of making money online fast, or get rich quick, lose 20lbs in 10 days just look the other way or better yet – report to spam.

How do you protect yourself from Twitter Spam? Tell us in the comments.

How to protect your twitter account from spam is a post from The Dustpan - Discussing Twitter Spam