WeChat declare war against Zombie accounts

On Chinese social media, celebrities and “influencers” purchasing fake followers, likes, and pageviews have long been a major thorn in the side of brands spending large amounts of money on endorsements to gain exposure. While this issue has been discussed extensively in regard to Sina’s microblogging platform Weibo, a new Tencent report shows that WeChat is far from immune to the problem as the company announces efforts to fight it. 

Tencent recently released a statement saying that it completed a security update to block fake accounts used to boost pageview numbers on WeChat articles, a practice known as “brushing” that is also a problem with fake product reviews and purchases on e-commerce sites. To demonstrate that pageview numbers had been adjusted as a result, it included a list of 10 examples of “influencer” accounts showing dramatic changes.

For example, technology reporter Li Yinghuan (李瀛寰) had an average rate of 27,000 page views prior to the security update, but afterward, the number went down to an average of 1,000 after September 28. Meanwhile, TripAdvisor previously boasted the maximum average number of views that can be published—100,000—but the rate sank down to 20,000 following the update. 

In response to the news, TripAdvisor released a statement to Campaign Asiastating that it is investigating the matter and is “absolutely opposed to the use of bots to boost social media views.”

The term “zombie” account refers to a somewhat sophisticated form of fakery, as the account generally features a person’s photo and can actively like items and even post comments. On Weibo, the term is used in contrast with more obvious fake accounts called “corpses,” which are generally inactive and just exist to boost follower numbers rather than engagement. 

The purchase of fake fans is often used by self-described “key opinion leaders” (KOLs) and “influencers” in order to trick brands into paying them for social media promotions. Making efforts to distinguish real KOLs from fake ones has been particularly challenging for brands, especially luxury labels looking for fashion blogger endorsements.

Fashion media was not immune to the changes, according to a WeChat post by Chinese luxury news site Ladymax. It published an article featuring alleged screenshots counting before-and-after pageviews on 23 different influential Chinese fashion media outlets, including Bazaar China showing a purported change from over 47,000 to 44,815, and one claiming to be of Vogue China that went from over 70,000 to 58,836. Some commenters were questioning the methodology of how the site came across the screenshots, and the article’s author says in a comment, “We monitored this data in the media over a long period of time,” stating, “you can look at the history to see that our data matches correctly.”