New algorithm may help reveal fake Facebook, Twitter accounts
New York, April 18: Scientists have developed a new generic algorithm based on machine-learning to detect fake accounts on social network platforms including Facebook and Twitter, an advance with considerable potential for applications in the cyber-security arena.
"With recent disturbing news about failures to safeguard user privacy, and targeted use of social media to influence elections, rooting out fake users has never been of greater importance," said lead researcher Dima Kagan from the Ben-Gurion University (BGU) in Israel.
The study showed that the algorithm is generic, and efficient both in revealing fake users and in disclosing the influential people in social networks.
"Overall, the results demonstrated that in a real-life friendship scenario we can detect people who have the strongest friendship ties as well as malicious users, even on Twitter," the researchers said.
Based on machine-learning algorithms, the new method, detailed in the journal Social Network Analysis and Mining, works on the assumption that fake accounts tend to establish improbable links to other users in the networks.
It constructs a link prediction classifier that can estimate, with high accuracy, the probability of a link existing between two users.
It also generates a new set of meta-features based on the features created by the link prediction classifier.
Using the meta-features, the researchers, constructed a generic classifier that can detect fake profiles in a variety of online social networks.
"We tested our algorithm on simulated and real-world data sets on 10 different social networks and it performed well on both," Kagan said.
Previously, researchers from the BGU had developed the Social Privacy Protector (SPP) to help users evaluate their friends list in seconds to identify which have few or no mutual links and might be "fake" profiles.
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Karnataka govt tables Rs 14,767 cr supplementary estimates in assembly
Bengaluru (PTI): The Karnataka government on Monday tabled the supplementary estimates in the assembly, totalling Rs 14,767 crore of additional expenditure for the current fiscal.
Tabled by Revenue Minister Krishna Byre Gowda on behalf of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, supplementary estimates are additional expenditures incurred by the government over and above the budget provisions.
In the fiscal ending March, additional expenditures include Rs 147 crore on the Sadhana Samavesha to mark two years of the Congress government and Rs 223 crore for railway barricading to prevent human-elephant conflict.
As per the supplementary estimates, the government spent Rs 1.25 crore to purchase a Volvo XC90 for former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda.
It also includes -- Rs 1,025 crore to clear various irrigation works bills, Rs 15 crore for helicopter and air travels by Governor, CM, ministers and other VIPs, Rs 110 crore towards scholarship and tuition fee reimbursement for minority students, Rs 15 crore for development of various temples, maths and trusts.
The government also spent Rs 1.4 crore to print a book comprising 'selected' speeches of Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot, Rs 50 lakh to clear pending electricity and water bills of ministers' residences, Rs 10 crore towards rehabilitation of families affected by landslides at Meppadi in Wayanad, Kerala.
Rs 5 crore each for Brahmin Development Board and Arya-Vysya Development Corporation, Rs 60 lakh to Supreme Court senior advocate Kapil Sibal for two appearances representing the government, Rs 5.13 crore towards bills from the Belagavi winter session of the legislature, Rs 5.5 crore towards pending bills from the 2019 and 2021 Assembly bypolls and the upcoming Davangere South and Bagalkot bypolls, are among the expenditures incurred.
