Thread by @Shayan86

THREAD: This type of Twitter account, right here, is among the worst on this platform.

It's a spam account that manipulates the empathy and compassion of users with the sole purpose of getting maximum engagement and building as large an audience as possible.

Let's take a look.

Let's start by checking its profile photo.

Run a simple reverse image search and you'll quickly see that not only has the image been taken from the internet, but it's a digitally-altered image of Turkish actress Özge Gürel.

It's not a real person. Not a good start.

Now, let's check some of its content.

Here, it claims to be disabled and asks for retweets and birthday wishes. The tweet did reasonably well. Lots of people responded.

But a simple reverse search reveals that's Canadian wheelchair racer Michelle Stilwell in 2012.

Here, it asks for prayers for its friend, who appears to be in a critical condition.

Reverse search the image and you'll see the "friend" is a young woman from Massachusetts, who was hospitalised in 2016 after a vodka binge and subsequently recovered.

Here, again, it pretends to be disabled and asks for retweets and likes, which it gets.

Reverse search shows that's Brazilian fitness model Paola Antonini in 2016, whose left leg was amputated after a horrific car accident and replaced with a prosthetic leg.

H/T @hoaxeye

The account claims to be a drawing artist and graphic designer. Let's look at some of its art.

The first one is actually by US artist Heather Rooney.

The second one is by Turkish artist Musa Çelik.

Literally all the art it posts as its own work is stolen.

Now, why does it matter? The account posts plenty of misinformation, but it's not calling for violence or benefiting either politically or financially.

Well, the problem is, once the account has built a big enough audience and engagement, it can be used for nefarious purposes.

It can suddenly change tack and start posting about political or social issues. It can be bought and sold for a variety of dodgy purposes. It can start asking for sponsored tweets. It can be used as part of a scam. It can be repurposed as part of an information operation.

This is just one example. There are plenty more such accounts on Twitter and other major platforms.

Learn the basics of reverse image search and never take anything you see online at face value.

There are plenty out there who want to mislead and manipulate you.

The account is likely part of a wider network of inauthentic accounts.

They all claim to be artists, have fake names and profile photos, post stolen art, farm engagement and following. Alarmingly, some have donation links in their bios.

There are many more.

H/T @DarrenLinvill

UPDATE: Twitter has now suspended some of the inauthentic accounts in the fake artist scam network, including @Jessica_art7. Some others have changed their profile photos and bios and have blocked me.

I'll report the entire network to Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook.

Please do not donate to any accounts in this fake artist scam network. If you know friends who follow one or some of the accounts in the network, tell them to unfollow and not donate.

The accounts are changing handles and profile photos. Be careful.

H/T @scammerhammer12

To sum up, by simply checking one suspicious Twitter account that masquerades as a good looking female artist and preys on people's empathy, we've spotted a much bigger and more sinister scam network that operates on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

This is platform manipulation.