We started looking at the followers of the GOP House/Senate candidates being amplified by #Mighty200+ retweet rooms, and lo and behold #NV04 candidate @LisaSongSutton has thousands of batch-created followers.
cc: @ZellaQuixote
cc: @ZellaQuixote
The batch-created accounts following @LisaSongSutton are part of a larger network consisting of (at least) 39430 dormant accounts created in batches in late 2014 and early 2015. All have similar numbers of tweets/likes/followers/followees and tweeted via Twitter Web Client.
This botnet reuses profile pics on multiple accounts, featuring a total of 3086 unique profile pics across 39430 accounts. The most common non-default image is used on 97 accounts.
What did these accounts tweet back when they were active? Many of their tweets are retweets, mostly of promotional/business accounts. Their original content appears to have been plagiarized from various writings of author Lafcadio Hearn.
Who does this botnet follow? Like the accounts they retweet, the accounts they follow are mostly non-political promotional accounts. @LisaSongSutton is an exception, although it followed her several years before her candidacy.
