Instagram is extremely popular and a great, free marketing resource for those who can build a worthwhile following. Those with large following can turn a profit by posting ads for businesses that mainly pay for access to the account’s community. A recent virus has made it possible for people to bolster their status and more readily appeal to businesses by buying a fake following.
The virus is a repurposed credit card information stealing program that generates “likes” and followers on Instagram. People with high “likes” and followers draw the attention of advertisers and sell face time with their community to them for high sums of money, making Instagram a lucrative market. With this virus, people buy 1000 “likes” for $30, and/or 1000 followers for $15, through online forums and then use the stats to trick advertisers into buying ad time on their account.
The scam is a lot more productive than the credit card scam that the virus was made from. 1000 credit card numbers typically brings in a paltry sum of $6 now that banks and credit card companies pay close attention and freeze cards the instant something is amiss.
How will people combat this new virus and marketing scam? Will they stop advertising on Instagram altogether? I guess only time will tell.
What would you do?
Source – The Verge
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