Research shows that Facebook alone has connected more than 120 billion friendships among its 2.3billion users, forming a complex network of connections based on the users’ common social identity and shared interests.
This is not far-fetched from other social networking platforms that have also connected people who know each other actually and virtually. However, within these intricate connections are hidden dark characters who are (or can be become) threats to unsuspecting users of these platforms.
The dangers seem grave because of the personal social information the users have shared over time making themselves or network of friends vulnerable to fake people and fraudsters.
This implies that they must be very careful when it comes to managing their personal profile pages than on their fan pages. Fan pages allow people to join the page by clicking a button (Like or Follow) but personal pages require a confirmation from the owner of the page for sender of the request to have access to the page of the receiver of the request.
It is, therefore, salient that users of these social media platforms consider some factors before accepting friendship request or sending one to people.
Checklist for identifying fake people and ‘fraudsters’ on social media
To avoid the incidence of unwanted characters infiltrating your social media network to fake their presence and conning users, a checklist of factors must be followed.
Profile data and identity: This is the first thing to do when you want to identify the people requesting friendship from you on various social media platforms. You have to check and inspect the profile data of the persons. Be sure the information they have about themselves is somewhat accurate or genuine. That is why it is paramount to connect with people you already know offline (or in real life) on your social media platforms. Be hesitant in accepting any request from strangers.
Match the name of the person to the image to be sure that female names have female pictures.
Be careful of profiles with a mismatch of name and gender. Avoid accepting requests from people who do not use their actual names, unless you know them in real life and they gave you their pseudonyms or aliases. Do not forget that social media is supposed to imitate our real life. So it is best to connect with people you already know in real life.
Number of friends: Find out the number of friends they have to their account. A friend can suggest other friends to you or you can follow the friends of your friends. Avoid piling up virtual people on your account without checking their friends. The more friends they have, the more they may seem genuine. Check if they have photographs of themselves and their friends on their personal accounts on social media. Be certain their friends are not fake people.
Mutual friends: Be sure you find out the number of friends you have in common with the new friend to be on the social media platform. When a person sends you a friend’s request or follows you, you must check if you have mutual friends. Use your judgment to even know the kind of mutual friends you have.
Possibly check if they have some posts in common on any of the party’s wall to prove that they have been interacting. Facebook gives you the option to see your mutual friends when you open the personal account page of anyone who sends you a request for friendship.
Frequency of posts: Since social media is for interaction and networking, you have to know the number of times people sending you the request have posted on their walls. If they send a lot of posts, it is possible they are real people or traceable people.
On the other hand, if they did not post frequently or have long intervals between their posts, you have to advise yourself. These persons may not be on social media to share their opinions, views or themselves with other people.
They are suspects. Accounts that are inactive can be removed if they are not the accounts of real life friends. Be careful of people who share a lot of images of other people or visuals without their personal comments.
Content themes of posts: By their posts, you can deduce the subject of contents they love. You can tell if they love talking about sports, entertainment, politics, law, education, corruption, sex, love or patriotism. Check if they love sharing some particular theme of contents on their wall. You can tell their preference and snippets of themes they are interested in.
Befriend people who share similar content themes as you. It is easier networking with them and building social bonds than with those who do not have anything in common with you. Any request must prompt you to examine the theme of their posts.
Common social interests: Friendships are built on common interests, not just out of loneliness. Examine the social interests that bind you together virtually. You can have the same content themes but have different perspectives about them.
These differences can cause friction or discomfort in your interactions online. If you do not have aligned social interests, there must be something else that must give you reason to accept a request.
Reasons for connection: You must have clear reasons why someone wants to connect with you though they do not know you or a real friend in actual life. Since you do not make friends for no reason in real life, you must replicate that on social media.
Do not fall for connecting with more friends at the expense of not having a reason. People who follow you may not fall under this category but you must know who they are and what attracted them to you.
When in doubt of their reasons, you can block them or unfollow them. There must be a reason for you sending a request or accepting one.
Social engineering requests: Some of your accepted friends or unknown ones will send you emails or chats requesting for help or some information from you. You must not fall for their social engineering schemes.
That is why you must not share your private information on your social media accounts or pages. If not, you will furnish them with details they will use against you. Fraudsters use your information to craft and send you messages requesting for help or offering you some help to make more money for you.
Never share private information or fall for the social engineering schemes from fraudsters on your social media accounts. Deal with people you know in real life and can trust as well.
Depth of personal posts: Never trust people who do not share information about themselves and what they do. People who request from friendship from you must have some record of personal information shared on their wall. Find out if they have pictures of events they have attended or group photographs with their friends. Also check if they have posted some personal views or contents you can relate to in real life.
Fake people and fraudsters do not leave many traces of their identity or activity on social media. You can remove those people from your list of friends. If they are not ready to share personal (not private) information about their social life or networks, do not accept their requests.
Offline identity and references: Internet facilitates the imitation of our real life. With internet connectivity we can share whatever we do in actual world in the virtual world, especially on social media platforms.
Much as possible, check for offline references of your social media friends. They must have some offline identity either by their educational profile, city or place of residence, companies they work at, and friends they hang out with.
There are several offline references indicated in the profile or page of your virtual friends. Use that to know who is open and genuine, and those who are fake or potential fraudsters. There must be offline indicators of the online personalities or interactions of your friends.