[scottmp10]

This is not a particularly informative article but I see great value in owning a Twitter botnet. As one example, imagine negative news about a major public company starts trending. That would certainly be a money-making opportunity. There are also hard-to-disprove rumors that you could blackmail high profile people with. Celebrities probably don't want to be trending on Twitter for having an affair, even if it is a fake report.

So I am not at all surprised that people are investing in building up tons of what appear to be legit, active accounts.

[at-fates-hands]

>>> There are also hard-to-disprove rumors that you could blackmail high profile people with.

This is exactly how the GCHQ use Twitter:

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140224/17054826340/new-sn...

"Among the core self-identified purposes of JTRIG are two tactics: (1) to inject all sorts of false material onto the internet in order to destroy the reputation of its targets; and (2) to use social sciences and other techniques to manipulate online discourse and activism to generate outcomes it considers desirable"