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Inside Facebook

Spammers Can “Use Facebook as Page” to Like-Spam Posts and Comments

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 07:15 PM PDT

Facebook recently launched a “Use Facebook as Page” feature for Page administrators that allows them to assume the identity of their Page so they can Like, post, and comment around the site. However, this has enabled a new spamming technique, whereby Pages can Like the posts or comments of other users and Pages to create links back to themselves.

Since there is no option to remove Likes or ban those who Like any Facebook feed item, a victim can’t delete the links, and their only option is to report the Page as spam and wait for Facebook to address the issue. Like spam has not become a significant issue yet, but holds an opportunity for malicious parties until Facebook creates a solution.


Facebook has introduced several new wall post and comment  spam prevention systems lately, automatically hiding posts containing suspicious links and turning suspicious comments gray to alert admins. Like-spam via Pages, though, only recently became possible, and therefore Facebook may not have recognized the risk.

Until the launch of Use Facebook as Page as part of the February 2011 Page redesign, only users could post and comment on the walls of other Pages, and they could be removed and banned from Pages. There is no option for an admin of a Page to ban another Page for Like-spam. The ban option only becomes available if the malicious Page posts or comments.

We’ve heard a few reports of Like spam, particularly by Pages whose name hocks a service, such as “We Fix Slow Computers”, even though this form of Like-spam has only been available for two months. Facebook needs to provide Page admins a way to ban other Pages from Liking content on their wall before it becomes a more popular method of driving traffic to spammy Pages.

[Thanks to Bryan Person for the tip]

To learn about tools your can Page can use to fight spam, visit the Facebook Marketing Bible's Service Provider Directory, a guide to the companies offering marketing and technical services to brands and organizations of all sizes on Facebook.

Webtrends Apps’ New Conversion Funnel Tool Offers Some More Facebook Ad Tracking

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 03:10 PM PDT

Webtrends Apps has released a new tool for Facebook advertisers that allows them to sync an ad campaign, a Facebook app, and an in-app action to create a conversion funnel. However, advertisers can only track the correlation between ads and in-app actions, not causality. At this point, it’s more relevant to smaller advertisers running fewer ads who want a general idea of the value ads are driving, rather than advertisers looking to optimize larger campaigns.

Webtrends acquired self-service and full-service web, mobile and social app developer Transpond in August, and rebranded it Webtrends Apps. Its last notable release was the addition of a drag-and-drop app creation interface and an integration with the Facebook Ads API in December.

To use the conversion funnel tool, Webtrends Apps users who are advertising for their apps log in through Facebook Connect and select the single ad campaign they want to track. They then select the app the ad links to and choose an action to track, such as a Facebook Share or the user switching tabs in the app. The funnel view then appears in the Webtrends Apps dashboard. The tool can be linked to the Facebook Ads API.

However, the system doesn’t employ tracking URLs or ad IDs. The only way to assess causality is for developers to create unique instances of their apps for each ad campaign, splintering an app’s userbase and potentially cluttering the navigation menu of Pages running the app in a tab. Otherwise, advertisers can create funnels for each ad they’re running, and watch to see if clicks to the ad correlate to in-app actions.

The new product will have to compete with sophisticated app conversion tracking-focused advertising services including Nanigans and AdParlor. These services install tracking pixels in apps and employ unique referral URLs to track conversions without requiring clients to create separate instances of their apps.

While light-weight with no coding necessary, the Webtrends campaign funnels too strictly limit advertisers to be an effective way of tracking any sizable or multi-channel ad campaign.

Highlights This Week from the Inside Network Job Board: Zynga, RealNetworks, & More

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 12:17 PM PDT

The Inside Network Job Board is dedicated to providing you with the best job opportunities in the Facebook Platform and social gaming ecosystem.

Here are this week's highlights from the Inside Network Job Board, including positions at Zynga, RealNetworks, Inside Network, Games Cafe, NaturalMotion, and 6waves.

Listings on the Inside Network Job Board are distributed to readers of Inside Facebook and Inside Social Games through regular posts and widgets on the sites. Your open positions are being seen by the leading developers, product managers, marketers, designers, and executives in the Facebook Platform and social gaming industry today.

Facebook Redesigns Friend Request Email Notifications to Fight Spam

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 10:28 AM PDT

This week Facebook redesigned the email notifications users receive when they’re sent a friend request. These emails now show stats about the request sender, including their friend, photo, wall post, and Group count, helping users identify spammers since they usually have few friends and little content. The emails also now include a link to “See All Requests” for batch request management.

Previously, requests only showed the name, profile picture, and mutual friend count of a friend request sender. If users answered requests via email and didn’t visit the sender’s profile, it would be difficult to tell if the person was a real acquaintance or a spammer looking to publish scams to their news feed.

Facebook has made several other moves this year to reduce friend request spam. In September it began preventing users from sending suspicious friend requests to people they are far removed from on the social graph. In January, it introduced a “Mark you don’t know him/her” response option to friend requests. Facebook limited the amount of friend requests that could be sent by those receiving too many of these marks.

Facebook’s Chief Technology Officer Bret Taylor said at our Inside Social Apps conference in January that Facebook had reduced spam by 95% in the last year, partly in thanks to these spam prevention features. However, Facebook has to be careful not produce false positives and accidentally block legitimate friend requests between two people that met in real life, even though they’re distant on the graph or one user has sent some unsolicited requests before.

These new email notifications bring a summary of what a user might manually check a profile for to determine if a friend request was spam. This should help reduce the number of spam friend requests that are accepted, and therefore keep the site cleaner and safer to use.

Horoscopes, Phrases, Video, Basketball and iPad on This Week’s Top 20 Facebook Apps by DAU

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 08:09 AM PDT

Horoscopes, phrases, videos and basketball made up the majority of our list of top 20 Facebook apps by daily active user this week. Dating, music, photos and security apps were also popular. Our list is compiled using AppData, our data tracking service covering traffic growth for apps on Facebook, and covers apps that gained the most users in the past seven days.

Top Gainers This Week

Name DAU Gain Gain,%
1. Daily Horoscope 1,839,822 +750,928 +69%
2. Daily Horoscope 962,558 +637,547 +196%
3. Mafia Wars Game 2,688,709 +409,468 +18%
4. BandPage by RootMusic 1,255,748 +368,221 +41%
5. Badoo 4,410,004 +350,916 +9%
6. Phrases 1,688,685 +296,582 +21%
7. Norton Safe Web 216,443 +176,729 +445%
8. Monster Galaxy 804,490 +163,921 +26%
9. Günlük Burç Yorumları 227,429 +133,090 +141%
10. Phrases (new) 410,486 +117,110 +40%
11. Frases Diarias 716,271 +107,779 +18%
12. VidyoTV Video 153,058 +102,253 +201%
13. Diamond Dash 94,956 +94,939 +558,465%
14. My Photos 298,128 +93,746 +46%
15. Persian’s Daily Clip 133,435 +89,629 +205%
16. CBSSports.com Brackets 96,733 +88,405 +1,062%
17. Monopoly Millionaires 642,588 +86,126 +15%
18. Friendly for iPad 768,112 +71,717 +10%
19. Bracket Challenge by Citizen Sports 77,231 +68,102 +746%
20. Videoloji 199,651 +67,215 +51%

The horoscope apps seem to be very popular with Turkish audiences. Daily Horoscope with 750,900 new DAU this week asks users if they'd like to publish the horoscope to their Wall , while the other Daily Horoscope with 637,600 DAU publishes a horoscope daily to your Wall, too. The Turkish version of this latter app, Günlük Burç Yorumları, posts daily horoscopes to your Wall and also asks users to invite dozens of people with the same zodiac sign to the app. This app grew by 133,000 DAU this week.

Phrases apps grew in non-English speaking countries this week. Phrases saw 296,600 DAU coming out of the Philippines, Mexico, France and Italy. Phrases (new) grew 117,100 DAU this week. Neither app was accessible in the U.S. and both provide users with phrases they can post to the stream. The Spanish app that performs a similar function, Frases Diarias, grew by 107,800 DAU this week allowing users to Like or share phrases by famous people, or create their own.

Video apps were also popular with Turkish users. There was VidyoTV Video which grew by 102,300 DAU; the app posts videos to the stream when the app is used and allows viewers options to also share videos. Persian's Daily Clip grew by 89,600 DAU and starts off by asking users to invite 20 friends to use the app; you subscribe to a daily video clip post on your Wall and the app automatically posts one upon use. Videoloji grew by 67,200 DAU and creates news feed stories by posting videos daily, also allowing users to share and Like them.

Basketball was on the list this week, too, due to March Madness, the NCAA college basketball tournament. CBSSports.com Brackets grew by 88,400 DAU; the app allows users to make bracket picks and share to the stream. The more involved, Bracket Challenge by Citizen Sports, saw 68,100 DAU this week and involves a $5,000 grand prize, syncs with an iPhone app, and includes trivia questions that users can post to the stream and alerts on your bracket.

Friendly for iPad grew by 71,700 DAU; the app is a popular Facebook application for iPad, since there is no official app. On Facebook clicking "Download App" takes users to the Apple store, where they may download the app.

Rounding out the list was BandPage by RootMusic, a music app for musicians and fans, which saw 368,200 DAU. Badoo, the dating app, is still growing with 350,900 DAU this week; the app utilizes a Q&A of a users' friends to generate attention in the feed. Norton Safe Web saw 176,700 DAU and generates a news feed story when it scans your feed for malicious links; users may also enable auto scan for regular scanning. Finally there was My Photos, with 93,700 DAU, which posts a photo from your Facebook photos daily to the stream.

torsdag den 24. marts 2011 at 07.47