As an open networker I tend to receive anywhere from 100 to 150 invitation requests each week. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve noticed some suspicious items about many of these invitations:
- Either no profile photo or a stock photo
- Use of the words “Independent” or “Student”
- Or no title at all
As I began looking at the profiles it was clear that these were basic accounts with little more than name and title. On about 50% of the questionable account there were three urls included but not much else.
I can’t say with 100% certainty that these are fake accounts but they look suspect. In the video I show about 8 of these accounts, and since I’ve screen captured these I’ve noticed another twenty or thirty similar accounts that I received invitations from.
What this means
If you are a closed networker, not much. If you are an open networker though you’re going to need to look a little more closely at the people you connect to. I currently look at every profile that I receive a request from. Its time consuming but if I want to continue to be an open networker than I need to avoid connecting to as many suspicious accounts as possible
Why do people create fake accounts?
I can think of two immediate reasons:
- To connect and then spam their connections through the messaging system
- To build links back to a site (for those that include the three url’s)
I’m sure there are many other reasons.
Watch the video and be sure to keep your eye on the people that you accept connection requests from.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwnsVehk9uI[/youtube]
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