I was not surprised that my new anti-virus found two threats on Twitter. There are bad links everywhere on Twitter. What surprised me was that the new anti-virus I just installed, after I had activated the social media protection option, sent out an automated direct messages to each of the two affected Twitter profiles letting them know that their tweets contained suspicious activity, and that they need to get protected by purchasing that anti-virus.
This is what I first saw in the dashboard of the social media section of the anti-virus. I also got an email alert on this:
Suspicious objects found
But what happened next surprised me. I noticed that two direct messages went out of my Twitter account without my consent or knowledge:
Tweet 1
Tweet 2
I just found this tactic a little too much. It’s one thing to warn people, but it is another thing to try to sell someone something. And make no mistake about it, they were encouraging a certain direction towards a sale. The tweet made it look like I recommended that they get protected with the ESET anti-virus software.
To explain this in better detail, I had just installed ESET two days ago. I was in the process of evaluating the anti-virus software. To make matters worse, I could have easily missed the fact that ESET was sending out warnings and promos for its product attached with my Twitter account. I quickly found the setting that was causing the direct messages to be automatically sent out, and I disabled it. Then I quickly apologized to the two individuals for my intrusion into their main email “Inbox”. My account means my fault. I should have checked for this activity.
Here’s the setting that was on by default when I activated ESET’s social media protection:
It’s ON by default!
I had to uncheck the “Warn others of infected objects” check box so that I did not send out any more direct messages to other peeps. I am not going to promote ESET to my peeps with only two days under my belt and without my knowledge. I should have known to check for this type of option in the Settings. But I still feel a little used on this one. Lesson learned compliments of ESET.
So here’s our walk-a-way for today: be careful what you let other 3rd party programs do when it comes to your social media. Go through all the settings and see what they want to do on your behalf.
One day I may recommend ESET to my friends, but I will know about it when I do it. It’s not going to happen behind my back or yours if we can help it.
Be safe out there….. and have a great day of business 🙂
