Social media is currently overtaken by fake accounts instead of real accounts and this problem caused many negative effects that could be resolved. This problem caused the spread of deception and social harm to spread widely. To tackle this problem social media platforms should spread awareness campaigns and create verification systems that strictly identify user’s identities.
Recently, one of the major issues in social media platforms is the rise of fake accounts that often lead to many problems. Because these fake accounts mainly focus on concealing their real identities to prevent getting caught for a suspected digital crime or virtual harm, they can easily get away with their wrongful acts. For instance, suspected crimes like hacking have caused the invasion of many social media accounts personal information’s, pictures and videos. However, virtual harm like cyberbullying, increasingly became common for hurting social media influencers mental wellbeing.
One of the possible solutions that should be implemented by the social media creators is the creation of a technical verification system and the spread of awareness campaigns. Since fake account’s main purpose is not providing their identification information’s and getting away with people ignorance on how to act when approached by fake accounts under different causes. For example, a social media application like Instagram has created a verification system page that asks users for their passport image, age details and driver license, if possible, to guarantee a real identity. And in this application a huge number of accounts have shared countless posts and reminders on how to report fake accounts which can prevent any loss or personalized access to any social media account.
To conclude, fake accounts have impacted social media platforms by reducing virtual safety measures and digital harm. And social media platforms must act accordingly to ensure the safety of users when using its application in their day-to-day lives. Protecting their personal information and mental well-being by creating verification systems and sharing a wide range of awareness campaigns through famous people that own a social media account and can behold a huge audience to help as much people as possible.