by Lisa Vaas on August 14, 2014
In its latest quarterly filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Twitter broke down its user base, saying that up to 8.5% of its monthly active users - about 23 million - are automatons.
From the report:
Up to approximately 8.5% of all active users used third party applications that may have automatically contacted our servers for regular updates without any discernable [sic] additional user-initiated action.Does that mean that 23 million Twitter users are actually bots?
http://sophosnews.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/170-ss_139253084-twitterbot1.jpg?w=640
Well, not exactly.
Twitter clarified that number with Engadget, saying that that 8.5% of accounts might not be restricted only to bots, but could also include automated processes such as publications' own Twitter feeds.
As Engadget's Mat Smith notes, Twitter's SEC filing doesn't give specifics on the numbers.
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