Fake Twitter followers offered for a fee

There are more than 40,000 fake accounts on social media networking sites in Saudi Arabia run by organized individuals, Arab News has discovered. The people running these accounts offer followers to anyone willing to pay money for this unethical service.
“When I reached 4,000 Twitter followers I was sent a request from an account that said it would cost me SR 50 for 1,000 followers. I was tempted by the offer and so I said yes to it,” said a Twitter subscriber.
“All I had to do was transfer the money. The next day I woke up with 5,000 followers and was so excited. But when I looked at the names, I was shocked. I saw names such as Beautiful Soso, Ittihad Lover, Coffee Addict and so on which made me suspicious. When I questioned the person who gave me the followers, he said they were all fake accounts that he managed and if I wanted active followers I would have to pay more to make them active,” he said.
Some Saudi Twitter subscribers are offered money by organizations and businesses to tweet about them. “It is funny how they operate and I was extremely shocked when a well-known clinic in Jeddah sent me a direct message on Twitter asking me to call them. When I did so I was offered SR 500 for each tweet I posted about them,” said a Twitter subscriber with 50,000 followers.
“I was tempted at first to take the offer and thought of only tweeting around 20 or 30 tweets to make some money but then I realized that people who follow me really trust me and really pay attention to what I say and so I rejected the offer. I know they will be targeting someone else with the same offer,” she added.
When Arab News contacted one of the people responsible for the fake Twitter accounts, the man said he guaranteed that no one would find out if we asked for the service. “We subscribe very fast. I have a team working with me in my home office that will access different accounts and follow the buyer,” he said. “We are fast, cheap and secretive so there is no need to worry about anything. All you need to do is transfer the money and we will take care of the rest,” he said.