Twitter to Begin Purging Millions of Suspicious Accounts

Twitter will begin removing tens of millions of suspicious accounts on Thursday in an effort to clamp down on fake followers, according to The New York Times. Some users have purchased followers to appear more influential on social media than they actually are. Those who have bought followers as well as those followed by “suspicious accounts” will see their numbers drop. Twitter said it intends to remove tens of millions of accounts, and the total number of followers on the platform will drop about 6 percent. “We don’t want to incentivize the purchase of followers and fake accounts to artificially inflate follower counts, because it’s not an accurate measure of someone’s influence on the platform or influence in the world,” said Del Harvey, Twitter’s vice president for trust and safety.