How To Find & Erase Unknown Spam Hidden In Your Twitter Account

Twitter has reached nearly 200 million users registered accounts who post 110 million tweets per day as of the January 1, 2011 and the company is now focused on building out its international presence.

However, I find myself thinking that co-founder Evan Williams should fix his incessant spam problems at home before he continues to expand.

Since Twitter seems blissfully unaware, I have written this post to help us combat the problem ourselves.

I constantly find myself wondering if I have been hacked and am sending those annoying spam messages (see pic upper left) to you.

Here are a few simple steps to find & erase unknown spam hidden in your twitter account.

1.) Go to your personal Twitter page. i.e. http://twitter.com/yourtwittername

2.) Click “Edit Your Profile.”

3. Click “Connections.”

4. Click “Revoke Access” to EVERY application that you do not fully recognize. I had TWELVE applications I had NO IDEA were there. For example, one called Twables which is a notorious spam social networking application.(Please note: At the time of this post, I had already revoked access to the offending applications and they are no longer there. The applications pictured below are ones that I have approved.)

5. Change your Twitter password now and often. I made sure to pick a password that was rated as “very strong.” I suggest you do the same. Be tricky! Your password should be at least 6 characters and not a dictionary word or common name. Change your password often.

Note: If you have trusted a third-party Twitter service or software with your password and you change it, you’ll need to re-authenticate to make that software work. (Never enter your password in a third-party service or software that looks suspicious.)

Be sure to come back here and tell me how many unknown applications were in your Twitter connections?

Anyone have further suggestions?

19 responses to “How To Find & Erase Unknown Spam Hidden In Your Twitter Account”

  1. Stan Avatar

    I will keep following your posts and I have bookmarked your site.

  2. Jeff Goins Avatar

    Those are great tips, Randy!

  3. Jacqueline Windh Avatar

    Thanks for the info, Randy.

    I checked my profile, and the only four applications that had access to my account are four that I have specifically given access to. I am pretty careful what a click, what a join, etc. – so I guess that shows that it works (compared to the people who had 8 or 14 or more!)

    But I still appreicate this info – I didn’t know that we could go in and find it like that.

    Jackie – @jwindh

  4. Jackie Collins Weber Avatar
    Jackie Collins Weber

    Hi Randy,

    Great post!

    I check my apps about once a month and have cut down on most of the spam. Another thing you can do to cut down on spam is to block the undesirable follower. If you ever get an undesirable follower, it’s not enough to just not follow them back. You need to block them. What many people don’t realise is that everyone that follows you now has your profile in their following list for others to find. Blocking removes their name from your list and your name from their list.

    Thanks again. @jackieweber

  5. Karin Avatar
    Karin

    Hi Randy

    Thanks for the tip. I had 14 apps, of which I just revoked 8.

    1. Randy Elrod Avatar

      @Karin, Wow! Thanks so much, Karin!

  6. deb Avatar

    Wow! I had 14 that I revoked access to… crazy! I never even looked at Connections before. Thanks Randy – that was very helpful!

    1. Randy Avatar

      @deb, Glad to help, Deb. If we all do this, our Twitter will be less “spammed.”

  7. Fred McKinnon Avatar

    I had quite a few apps … none that seemed rogue, but plenty that were not being used. Good tips!

  8. Andrew Acker Avatar
    Andrew Acker

    I had quite a few actually, only 8 were junk ones though. It’s amazng how tricky those things can be. Who knew!

    1. Randy Avatar

      @Andrew Acker, Yep! Those 8 could be wreaking havoc. Thanks!!

  9. mikeraburn Avatar

    Wow. Found 7 apps I had never heard of and had not approved. Also found every app I have tried (and rejected) for my iPhone and iPad. Thanks for the tip.

    1. Randy Elrod Avatar

      @mikeraburn, Awesome, Mike. Glad to help. Thanks for teaming for “spam-free” Twittersphere.

  10. Gina Parris Avatar

    Wow. This was really interesting. I was surprised to have 32 apps in my connections, but I like them all! Things like ezine articles and TubeMogul (which served as a reminder to use TM). The only one I deleted was a geofollow or something, since I live in such a small town.
    Have you ever done a post on recommended apps?

    1. Randy Elrod Avatar

      @Gina Parris, No I haven’t, Gina. But that is a great idea. I’ll keep that in mind. 32 apps. wow!

  11. Kevin Owens Avatar

    Thankfully, I found no unknown applications in my Twitter connections. Still, this is great advice and we can never be reminded enough to have strong passwords and to change them frequently. Thanks for posting.

    1. Randy Elrod Avatar

      @Kevin Owens, Thanks, Kevin for joining the conversation and I’m glad you had no “foreign” application.

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