Social Media

Users of Twitter crave different things -- everything from an edit button (now available to some) to account verification.

For anyone seeking the much sought-after blue tick, Twitter has revamped its Help Center pages, providing detailed information about how to get verified. While not complicated, the updated guide provides clear information about exactly how to apply, and how to increase your chances of a successful application for verification.

Twitter is looking to make sharing content easier and wider-reaching by cross-pollinating with other social platforms. The micro-blogging site -- which may or may not end up being bought by Elon Musk -- is adding an option for sharing tweets via WhatsApp.

For now, the new sharing option is limited to certain markets, but it is hard to imagine that it will not spread globally in the near future. The question is, will it be welcomed by users or not?

Microsoft has revealed details of a high severity vulnerability in the TikTok app for Android. The Microsoft 365 Defender Research Team shares news of the now-fixed security flaw which the company says could have allowed an attacker to take over a victim’s account by simply getting them to click a malicious link.

With hundreds of millions of users around the world, TikTok is one of the most popular social platforms at the moment; the potential damage from the successful exploitation of such a vulnerability is huge.

Have you ever thought about what happens after your physical shell expires? What legacy will you leave and what becomes of it with time? We can give our tangible belongings to friends and family. If the work is copyrighted, the protection will usually extend well beyond the author’s lifespan.

The law has, however, yet to catch up with the times as we also share, store and use tons of information online. That encompasses our digital identity, which is often left unattended after death, lingering at the digital graveyard at the mercy of tech giants.

Twitter, possibly more than other social platforms, seems to bring out the very worst in many people. Apparently magnifying the emboldening effect the relative anonymity of posting online brings, users often find that responses to their tweets stray a long way from what most would consider reasonable. Now Twitter is working on a solution.

Spotted in the code of the Twitter app, an upcoming "Reply filter" feature will give users the ability to control the type of response they see. Importantly, the feature does not introduce any new restrictions on what others are able to post as a reply; it just gives users the opportunity to avoid exposing themselves to upsetting responses by filtering them. Think of it like a spam folder for tweet replies. It is something that will be welcome by many different types of user -- those with verified accounts, those with a degree of celebrity, those from certain societal groups, those unwilling to deal with online abuse, and others.

Twitter has confirmed that a hacker was able to exploit a security vulnerability on the social platform earlier this year, gaining access to the private data of millions of users.

In total, 5.4 million accounts were affected, with the attacker able to link account names to email addresses and phone numbers. While the incident took place back in January this year, Twitter has also revealed that the exposed user data was made available to buy just last month. In what will be regarded by many as something of an understatement, the company says that "it is unfortunate that this happened".

It was hardly a surprise when Twitter launched a subscription service in the form of Twitter Blue. In exchange for $2.99 a month, anyone keen to gain access to extra feature could help top up the social media company's coffers.

But it seems that the coffers have not been topped up enough as Twitter has announced a price hike. The cost of a Twitter Blue subscription jumps by two thirds for new subscribers with immediate effect, and existing subscribers can expect to pay the new, higher price in the near future.

The latest quarterly report from NortonLifeLock's global research team, Norton Labs, looks at how cybercriminals are using social media phishing attacks to steal private information.

Based on analysis of a full year of phishing attacks on the top social media platforms, it finds plenty of fake login pages designed to trick victims into inputting their login credentials, but also a diversity and complexity of lures going far beyond that one technique.

Facebook's love of algorithms has meant that there has been a highly polarizing focus on recommended content in users' feeds rather than posts from friends, family and pages of genuine interest. But this is changing.

In a move that will please millions of Facebook users who have become increasingly frustrated with the way recommended content is pushed into their feed, Mark Zuckerberg has announced that iOS and Android users are being treated to feed split over two tabs. While one of these will remain populated with content surfaced by Facebook's "discovery engine", the other is a chronological feed of content from friends, groups and Pages.

When the richest person on Earth offered to buy Twitter for $44 billion, the eyes of the world pivoted to Elon Musk to watch the drama unfold. And the drama did not disappoint, played out over several month.

There has been speculation for some time that Musk's plans to buy Twitter would fall through, and those who predicted this may just have been proved right. Musk's lawyers have written to the social media company to say that the deal is now off, citing Twitter'ss failure to provide information that had been requested. Twitter has responded saying that it intends to sue Musk and force him to complete the merger.

Four dollars a month. That's all the new Snapchat+ service will cost you. Well, technically it is $3.99... but whatever. Earlier today, Snap Inc. announced this new "plus" subscription designed for power users and enthusiasts of the social platform. While that isn't a lot of money, it still doesn't mean Snapchat+ is a good value. In fact, many users will be shocked by what the premium service is lacking.

Unfortunately, despite paying Snap Inc. a monthly fee, Snapchat+ users will still see advertisements when using the app. This is very surprising (and disappointing), as many people assumed that a premium Snapchat subscription would get rid of ads. Instead, Snap Inc. is hoping users will find value in exclusive features, such as the ability to change the Snapchat icon on mobile or designate another user as your BFF (best friend forever).

Like most social media platforms, Instagram has a minimum age for users -- in this instance, it is 13 years old. But verifying ages online -- particularly for non-adults -- has long proved difficult. Now Instagram thinks it has come up with a solution.

As part of measure to enforce age limits more strongly, Instagram is preparing to use a variety of techniques to confirm that younger users are the age they claim to be. One of the options that will be available to such users is uploading a video selfie which will be shared with age-checking agencies.

It took quite a while, but Twitter eventually decided to increase the maximum length of tweets to 280 characters. For some people, this is still not enough, and threading is not for everyone. It is with this in mind that Twitter has started testing a new long-form writing format called Notes.

Twitter has long been referred to as a micro-blogging service, and Notes takes things to the next level, essentially giving users the ability to write blog posts of any length. As well as eliminating the character limit, Notes can also include photos, videos and even embedded tweets. Best of all, Notes are editable. This may not be the "edit tweet" option people have been looking for, but it is a step in that direction.

For people with less sense than money, there are NFTs to waste hard-earned cash on. But Meta is introducing a new way to part fools from their money -- Avatars Store.

These will be available for Facebook, Instagram and Messenger, and will give users the opportunity to buy digital clothes with which to adorn their avatar. Attempting to justify the selling of more digital fluff, Mark Zuckerberg insists that "digital goods will be an important way to express yourself in the metaverse and a big driver of the creative economy".

The Facebook Messenger 'Is That You?' video phishing scam has been around since 2017, but a recent investigation into it by researchers at Cybernews has led to the discovery of what they're calling a 'cybercriminal stronghold'.

Threat actors are using this to infect the social network with thousands of malicious links each day. The research has also identified at least five suspects, thought to be residing in the Dominican Republic.