We've seen some overzealous reactions to Twitter suspensions before, but spammy repetitive tweets implying that the banned accounts belonged to a literal deity is a new twist. #SaturdaySpam
cc: @ZellaQuixote
cc: @ZellaQuixote
We downloaded all tweets tagging the now-suspended @davidroads and containing "Christian", "30 million", and "followers, yielding 1164 tweets from 845 accounts. The traffic doesn't appear automated based on software used.
The tweets are all variations on a few templates with different accounts tagged. Most frequently tagged accounts:
@jack - 1161 tweets (99.7%)
@FoxNews - 1137 tweets (97.7%)
@TwitterSupport - 784 tweets (67.4%)
@realDonaldTrump - 621 tweets (53.4%)
@ABC - 590 tweets (50.7%)
@jack - 1161 tweets (99.7%)
@FoxNews - 1137 tweets (97.7%)
@TwitterSupport - 784 tweets (67.4%)
@realDonaldTrump - 621 tweets (53.4%)
@ABC - 590 tweets (50.7%)
What did the accounts whose bans gave rise to this spammy outrage look like? The @davidroads account appears to have been an "inspirational quotes"-style account; based on the attached website, it was one of 30 operated by the same entity.
Here are the first 20 tweets demanding the reinstatement of @davidroads and related accounts, sent over a span of 2.5 hours late on March 9th. Interestingly, none of these accounts follow each other; they are all followed by the newly-minted @davidroads2, however.
Thus far, we've been unable to determine exactly how this spam operation was coordinated; we searched various other platforms for planning/discussion and came up empty. We do, however, note that the accounts doing it disproportionately retweet #MAGA accounts.
Postscript: we'd like to extend our appreciation to this diligent IFTTT bot for quote tweeting this thread 13 times. Thanks, @somitspeaks!
