Why your ‘likes’ are worth gold on the social media black market

Real and fake ‘thumbs-ups’ are being sold by the thousand to marketing companies in a bid to boost their clients’ popularity, says Tom Jenkin
Tom Jenkin27 August 2013

Pictures of puppies in sunglasses, a luscious-looking birthday cake, moaning about the unbearable crowds on the Tube: all things I liked and re-tweeted this morning.

However, these were not indifferently alluring newsflashes from individuals but cleverly targeted marketing ploys. I’ve been duped and, along with a thousand others, effectively endorsed them.

“Likes” lost their cheerful innocence the moment marketers realised their amazing brand-enhancing properties but the power of social media now has a new measure: a single “like” is worth four times a 16-digit credit card number on the black market.

Companies or individuals looking to make an impact on social media in the quickest way have turned to hacker forums and services providing fake likes. Ever trend-sensitive, hackers have adapted a virus called “Zeus”, previously used to access credit card numbers, to create fake likes on Instagram. Now a bundle of 1,000 likes goes for just under £20. The same quantity of credit card numbers fetches just under a fiver.

Indeed, some marketing companies have already found that it can pay to use services that give their clients a large following dominated by fake profiles, employing Facebook “click farms”, where fake likes come from “real” users.

Although all social media platforms strongly condemn the practice of acquiring fake followers, anyone can do it by buying a lot or paying for the service. For just £12 ubuyfacebooklikes.com adds 500 likes to a page. For £140, you can get 10,000.

All customer assistant Matt Smith, of ubuyfacebooklikes.com, could say was that to encourage real users to like a page, they “created a contest”.

Popularity endows a person or product with a cloak of credibility, or so the power-of-like argument goes: the more likes something has, the more users are likely to spend actual money. Essentially, fake likes are false advertising claims.

Robin Grant, global managing director of social media marketing company We Are Social, disagrees with this analysis. “It’s basically peacocking — there’s no rational economic incentive.”

Social media users are, however, left wondering if the figures they base their opinions on are real. And how can you tell if you’re being influenced by fake likes?

On Facebook, a few clicks will show you the main location of likes, so if a UK brand’s most popular city is Kandahar, you know something is amiss. A dramatic jump in likes gives the general game away but buying 100 likes here and there can be discreet and effective because there is no quick way to detect individual fakers on either Facebook or Instagram.

However, the free app StatusPeople does tackle Twitter, telling you how worthy a particular following is by analysing the proportion of fake and inactive followers. Lead developer Rob Waller understands why the practice of fake likes is so prominent. “Marketing on social media is very new and industry best practices haven’t been defined yet. It’s very hard to legislate as the game keeps changing and developing.”

So next time you’re dithering over whether to buy that essential luxury with a zillion likes, think again. On the other hand, having only a handful of followers suddenly looks authentic and exclusive.

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