Defending Your Privacy with STCP
https://enews.wvu.edu/articles/2021/10/12/defend-your-data-use-these-tips-to-identify-fake-social-media-accounts
It is becoming more common for older adults to get tricked by fake accounts online. This can lead to the spread of fake news and scams or a violation of privacy for individuals. A main reason for why older generations are more likely to fall for fake accounts is digital illiteracy. Our generation grew up with the initiation of the internet and social media so we are much more familiar with identifying spam accounts online. For class we had to solve a problem identifying fake spam accounts from a graph which consisted of nodes and edges and represented a social media network. In real life, we aren’t able to see an actual graph with nodes or see strong/weak labels for relationships with people. On social media platforms such as Instagram, we can look at an unknown user’s follower count and any present mutual followers. The article linked talks about looking at a user’s followers and reviewing if their followers are authentic.
In the homework problem, I found that one of the nodes was more likely to be a spam account because all the edges coming in or out of it were likely to be weak ties. The other nodes in the graph were in at least one triadic closure which made them more credible accounts. Even though we were not given whether the ties were weak of strong, the fact that the other nodes were in triadic closures made them more likely to satisfy the Strong Triadic Closure property. The STCP is satisfied when someone has 2 ties and those 2 nodes which that person has ties to also has a node between them. We did not know whether the ties in that network were strong or weak but since the node was not in any triadic closure it was less likely for that node to have strong ties. On a platform such as Instagram, I am able to see mutual followers between me and a user I do not know. If someone I do not know tries to follow me and we do not have any mutuals, I know I am definitely not in a triadic closure with them and will likely not accept their follow request. However, if they have many mutual followers with me, I am less likely to label them as a random spam account because people I can see that people I know trust them enough to follow them. Older generations can think of the strong triadic closure property as one of the ways they can identify spam accounts and protect their privacy.