Elon Musk's X social network sues 8 Vietnamese

According to The Independent , a huge "fake click" facility in Vietnam is accused of illegally profiting from Elon Musk's X platform. These people took advantage of control loopholes in the Creator Revenue Sharing program. Those named by the social network in the lawsuit include Le Dinh Chung, Nguyen Nhu Duc, Do Viet Khanh, Nguyen Viet Kieu, Do Xuan Long, Do Minh Thang, Nguyen Ngoc Thanh, Phan Ngoc Tuan.

This is an initiative promoted by the world's richest man as a way for X users to earn money through posts on their personal pages.

Generate bulk fake interactions

The federal complaint against X alleges that the click-bait operation was run by a group of eight people in Hanoi , Vietnam, who posted automatically generated content to a network of fake X profiles, set up using stolen identities “to engage in organized manipulation of the platform,” according to the plaintiffs.

Accounts within this network will then interact with each other's content. The ultimate goal is to trick platform X and earn revenue.

X’s complaint does not specify the assets the group obtained. Evidence from the payments shows that money was transferred to at least 125 bank accounts in the United States under false names. They were then transferred to records under real names, at nine banks in Vietnam, in more than 1,700 separate transactions.

A massive fake click farm in Vietnam is accused of illegally profiting from Elon Musk’s X platform. Photo: US District Court for the Northern District of Texas.

"They used software to create virtual interactions within a network of accounts that were jointly owned and controlled. This is similar to a broker in the financial industry being able to 'rotate' profits by engaging in excessive and unnecessary transactions in customers' investment accounts, to generate additional commissions," X wrote in its application to the authorities.

According to the complaint, an independent team of investigators working for X found the names and addresses of eight individuals. The data was sourced from third-party payment processing sites such as PingPong and Payoneer.

Loopholes in the revenue sharing program

X’s revenue-sharing program launched in 2022, shortly after Musk acquired the platform for $44 billion . Initially, users who signed up for $8 a month to get a blue tick would receive a portion of the revenue generated from ads targeting other high-end properties.

After major advertisers began to leave X, the platform tweaked the program. It allowed casual accounts to earn money based on the engagement they generated with paying users. Payouts varied based on a variety of factors. The Independent estimates that X pays around $8 per 1 million impressions.

In addition to profiting from virtual interactions, the group also sold automation tools and techniques, making money by “selling” the fraudulent X course, the complaint said.

Portraits of eight subjects in a massive virtual interaction ring on X. Photo: US District Court for the Northern District of Texas.

In addition to the fraud allegations at the heart of X’s complaint, the lawsuit also alleges trademark infringement. The lawsuit claims that they “misappropriated and misappropriated” the Twitter and X trademarks by including their logos in the thumbnails of their YouTube tutorial videos .

Musk has vowed to ban “fake engagement” on X. But experts say paying for clicks only encourages it to continue. “Anytime there’s a monetary value attached to clicks, there will be people who will cheat them,” said one CEO of a social media marketing company in Illinois.

Before X, fake clicks and fake interactions were already a headache for other social networks. In 2019, Facebook and Instagram simultaneously filed a lawsuit in the US federal court against four Chinese companies for selling fake accounts, likes, and followers. These organizations also expanded their services illegally on many other platforms such as Amazon, Google, LinkedIN, and X.

Companies selling fake likes and followers claim to be professional foreign marketing firms. Others are more modest, describing themselves as potential marketing partners.

"It's been 10 days but my likes and followers are still stable, no one has unfollowed me. Great customer service," commented a customer below.

Source: https://znews.vn/mang-xa-hoi-x-cua-elon-musk-kien-8-nguoi-viet-post1556292.html