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Elon Musk Gets Help From Dogecoin Creator Against Twitter Bots

Wilma Woo | Sep 17, 2018 | 16:00

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Tesla creator Elon Musk sought help eradicating Twitter’s infamous bots from an unlikely source September 16, publicly asking Dogecoin founder Jackson Palmer for help.

Palmer: Twitter ‘Should Automate’ Botnet Fix

In an exchange Sunday, Palmer confirmed he had given code to Musk in order to prevent bots posting fake giveaway advertisements below his genuine tweets.

“Elon has the script… we had a good chat on how [Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey] and the Twitter team should definitely automate and fix this problem on their end though,” he wrote.

Update: Elon has the script… we had a good chat on how @jack and the Twitter team should definitely automate and fix this problem on their end though. 🤷‍♀️

— Jackson Palmer (@ummjackson) September 17, 2018

Musk continues to court controversy in the mainstream press this month over an ongoing spat – also focused on Twitter – between him and a UK diver who assisted an operation to free a group of children trapped in a cave network in Thailand last month.

Despite many commentators denouncing him for his derogatory statements about the man in question, the cryptocurrency community appeared to react with excitement to the entrepreneur engaging with Palmer.

DOGE’s Stint In The Spotlight

The interaction constitutes additional publicity for Dogecoin 00 itself, having also seen its fortunes reverse in recent weeks after its network bridge with Ethereum sparked price and volume rises.

As Bitcoinist reported, daily volume shot up an enormous 2800 percent following the launch of ‘Dogethereum,’ reaching $144 million September 1.

For Twitter meanwhile, the scourge of the automated botnets and their spurious giveaway posts shows no sign of abating.

Despite multiple calls from cryptocurrency industry figures to address the problem, including from Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, no formal measures have surfaced.

“Twitter is aware of this form of manipulation and is proactively implementing a number of detections to prevent these types of accounts from engaging with others in a deceptive manner,” a spokesperson said in response to research on the phenomenon published in August by cybersecurity firm Duo Security.

Duo had revealed some botnets active on the social network numbered tens of thousands of entities employing sophisticated techniques to avoid detection and shutdown.

What do you think about Elon Musk asking for help from Jackson Palmer? Let us know in the comments below!

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Twitter