How to protect your brand against social media hackers

Wherever legitimate users go to consume and share content online, fraudulent users are standing by looking to gain access to that same distribution channel, according to Mark Risher, CEO and co-founder of Impermium.

“Whether it’s a comment forum, a social network, a content management system, or your personal email, the results of this hacking can be widespread and negative for your brand,” Risher said. “The results of them getting through can be widespread and very painful. It can range from user annoyance to actual user harm.”

“Consumers are using more sites and communicating in many different ways online, so are the bad guys pushing content through these social media channels. The content that they push through takes on many different forms. On email we have all developed a healthy degree of skepticism. But on the social web, there are different behaviors that we all engage in and we don’t have that same degree of skepticism,” he added.

Risher recently presented a lecture series, Social Security: Protecting Your Brand Against Social Media Hackers, as part of HootSuite University’s library of social media content. He shared his top three tips for protecting a brand.

Block bogus accounts

“Pay attention to where accounts were created,” said Risher. “You can’t rely fully on a service provider to screen accounts before they come to you. The sites you use are relying on third party credentials from the big social networks. There are secondary checks that are worth doing. There are many fake social media accounts. It’s important to use due diligence.”

Prevent account hijacking

It’s important to pay attention on your sites and the sites you use, Risher recommends. “On your sites, such as blogs and content management systems, make sure people can log into your own site. It’s equally important to protect your accounts on different sites,” he said.

“Though you may not operate your own content portals, you all have accounts on other social networks. It’s important to protect the credentials you’re utilizing on those sites. That means making a strong password. Make sure you don’t distribute passwords to everyone in your marketing department unless you absolutely need to,” Risher added.

Monitor account actions

While it’s good to have a strong password policy, you also need to pay attention to whether some accesses it, says Risher. “Make sure you have someone who is continuously paying attention to your site and monitoring what is taking place. Make sure you’re paying attention and have a plan in place if you see something bad occurs on your site.”