Mitt Romney's Fake Twitter Follower Problem

As of July 20, Mitt Romney’s Twitter account had about 690,000 followers. That’s more than you or me (oh, hush, John Dickerson), but it’s a paltry number compared to that of Romney’s opponent: @BarackObama boasts some 18 million.

On a typical day in the past month, Romney’s Twitter account has gained 3,000 to 4,000 new followers, according to Zach Green, whose blog 140elect.com tracks campaign-related Twitter trends. So when Romney’s follower count began growing by the thousands on Friday evening, Green took notice. In a post titled, “Is Mitt Romney Buying Twitter Followers?”, Green pointed out that Romney’s account added over 100,000 followers over the weekend, for no apparent reason. Liberals on Twitter jumped on the case, noting that many of Mitt’s new fans appeared to be fake—spambots, pornbots, and accounts set up purely to inflate other accounts’ follower count. One of the more amusing finds: At least five of Romney’s newfound followers shared the same profile picture, which turned out to be that of an Internet marketer named Ben Sarma. Was Romney’s campaign buying Twitter followers? It’s not inconceivable, but it seems unlikely.