Twitter spam has hit a lot of really high profile people and brands over the last few days (The Guardian, Harriet Harman, the UK Press Complaints Commission, Ed Milliband, first direct to name but a few:) and as we’re all frequent Twitter users at Wolfstar we thought we’d tell you how to stop Twitter spam.
So you’d like to avoid everyone thinking about your sex life? Yet Twitter keeps breaking ranks and telling them? Lot’s of Twitter users have fallen into spam traps by clicking dubious links sent to them in direct messages – the link is basically authorises people to access your account without needing any details.
Here’s a quick guide on how to ensure that everything to do with the DM spam and hacking will go away and stay away…
In its most basic form, Twitter spam occurs when you click on a link and that link gives someone else access to your account (or OAuth, for the geeks among us) without you having to give them your password or username – nasty stuff. If you’ve had your account compromised, then you’re in good company, it seems like lots of people on Twitter has fallen for it.
Now, here are the all important next steps to solving your DM spam problems;
‚· Log in to Twitter using the web interface – http://twitter.com
‚· Click on ‘Settings’
‚· Click on ‘Password’ and change it to something very complicated (AKA Turnt4b1e or something with numbers and letters mixed up)
‚· Now click on ‘connections’ and anything that you don’t recognise click ‘revoke access’ (OAuth is explained in more detail here)
‚· Now log out and everything should be fine – just avoid clicking on anything you don’t trust in the future!
The part in bold is really, really important. Really important.
Disclaimer: we’ve worked with first direct and we are advising them on this issue.
