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| Image Credit: rumkihn.com |
With the rise of Pinterest there is also the rise of people who are willing to create bots run them and spam the system to make a lot of money. BOTS is defined as Roberts, automated processes. Now there are users who have created BOTS also called internet robots are essentially software programs that run automated tasks over the internet. They can be cleverly written by Spammers to game internet sites. Pinterest it appears is now high on the list of Spammers. The reason for this is simple statistics show that 28.1% Of Pinterest Users Have A Household Income Of Over $100,000, 68% Of Pinterest Users Are Female. You now get the picture.
So how does a spammer exploit the situation.
Sign-up for an Amazon Affiliate Account, once you do this you get a code which can be used when you sell anything online on the web, using your site, blog or any other means. So once your on Pinterest you can start sharing pictures of items to sell and people who like the pics being shared will then repin them, comment and sometimes as it so happens click on the picture. Land on Amazon.com and make a purchase. Once this purchase is made it is linked to the Spammers account because of the affiliate link and the spammer gets a percentage. The Daily Dot ran an interview with a spammer named Steve who speaks about how he makes over $1,000/day.
The bots help by following many people and boards above the approved limit of 200 by Pinterest. They can also keeping pinning photo of items continuously, follow any number of users, repin and resubmit pins constantly. Effectively beating the system and breaking all rules.
Does this effect my Pinterest experience in any way
You are not exploited in the sense your account does not get compromised. Neither is your privacy violated in any way. Your money however gets swindled by spammers who essentially get you to buy something you might not want or need. This is the way it stands right now and it is up to Pinterest to stop and shut down accounts that belong to Spammers.
Source: The Daily Dot, you can also read Spammer gimme4free's report on the Black Hat World where he has a bot that is for sale.