Facebook and Washington State take on clickjammers

Facebook is a great legal marketing tool; by getting users to like a page a business can increase their visibility on the internet as a whole. While many companies provide ethical and honest social media marketing there are others that will game the system and when they do Facebook will find them.

Facebook and Washington State Attorney General Rob McKenna are teaming up to sue a company accused of “spreading spam through deceptive and misleading tactics.”

Ascend Media allegedly utilized a practice called clickjamming,  a technique that involves posting links designed to take people to an outside link, which includes a code that causes the links to appear on the users’ homepage as a “liked” item without the user’s permission.

The spam is usually in the form of an enticing video that requires a person to complete a survey asking for personal information before they can view the video. The information is then gathered and given to Ascend Media’s clients.

Facebook likens its effort to cut down spam as an “arms race” and want its users to a have a positive experience on its site.

People trust the opinions of their friends and this can help drive business. For legal internet marketing one like on a social media network can translate to a great deal of exposure.

This delegitimizes the hard work done by legal internet marketing companies such as Digital Age Marketing, who provide ethical social media and search engine marketing.