Twitter hails huge drop in spam

 

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By Hani Megerisi

Posted on 24 Mar 2010 at 11:27

Twitter claims it has slashed the amount of spam tweets from an August peak of 11% to only 1%.

“With help from engineers on our research team… we've moved the percentage of spam flowing through the Twitter network way down - and counting,” said Abdur Chowdhury, the company's chief scientist, in a post on the Twitter blog.

We’re constantly battling against spam to improve the Twitter experience and we're happy to report that it's working

Twitter has introduced several methods to combat spam, including educating users on the larger threats. This site has also introduced the Twit.tl link shortening service, which scans for links to malicious sites in a bid to prevent phishing attacks.

“Like it or not, as the system becomes more popular, more and more spammers will try to do their thing," Chowdhury added. "We’re constantly battling against spam to improve the Twitter experience and we're happy to report that it's working."

“While the battle will never be over, we're doing well on the front lines."

The continuing threat was highlighted earlier this week, with a new Twitter phishing scam that attempts to steal users' login details.