Bots, simply defined as accounts controlled by automation, can be used as a weapon for online manipulation and pose a threat to the health of platforms. Researchers have studied online platforms to detect, estimate, and characterize bot accounts. Concerns about the prevalence of bots were raised following Elon Musk's bid to acquire Twitter. Twitter's recent estimate that 5\% of monetizable daily active users being bot accounts raised questions about their methodology. This estimate is based on a specific number of active users and relies on Twitter's criteria for bot accounts. In this work, we want to stress that crucial questions need to be answered in order to make a proper estimation and compare different methodologies. We argue how assumptions on bot-likely behavior, the detection approach, and the population inspected can affect the estimation of the percentage of bots on Twitter. Finally, we emphasize the responsibility of platforms to be vigilant, transparent, and unbiased in dealing with threats that may affect their users.
翻译:仅仅被定义为自动化控制的账户的博特人可以被用作在线操作的武器,对平台的健康构成威胁。研究人员研究了在线平台,以检测、估算和描述博特账户。艾隆·穆斯克试图获取Twitter之后,人们提出了对博特人普遍性的担忧。推特最近估计,5 ⁇ 可货币化的日常活跃用户是博特人账户,这引起了对其方法的质疑。这一估计基于特定数量的活跃用户,并依赖于Twitter的机器人账户标准。在这项工作中,我们要强调,为了进行适当的估计和比较不同的方法,必须回答关键问题。我们争论,对机器人行为、检测方法和受访人口的假设如何影响对Twitter上博特人比例的估计。最后,我们强调平台有责任警惕、透明和不带偏见地应对可能影响其用户的威胁。