Sunday, September 5, 2010

SHOP TWEETS BEING HIJACKED - A WARNING TO ETSY BONANZLE ZAZZLE & EBAY SHOPS

I recently had the following happen to me.
I got a tweet and a follow by @KSL01 (that is a zero one not the letter O) so I followed him back since he has a shop on Etsy.

He then did some RT's of my things, so I returned the favor.
One day, I decided to click on the item since it said "geode pendant" since I have so many of them, I wanted to see which one he had tweeted.
Well it turns out, he had left my description in place and replaced the URL with HIS own item.
The tweets & retweets were being directed to his belt!
I then warned him to stop, and even sent him a link to this page telling him how to get tweets and to be retweeted.
He stopped for a few days, then came back and started doing it again.
Since our URL's are shortened, you are unable to see your name in the URL, so had I not clicked that one, I would have never even known, and probably even given him a retweet of one of HIS items, then he would have gotten both MY hits and the ones I sent to him!
He is EVIL!
I was then quite angry so I blasted all over twitter the following:
"ITEMS TWEETED OR RETWEETED BY @KSL01 ARE NOT MINE - PLEASE DO NOT RT THEM THINKING THEY ARE MY ITEMS".
Next thing he just started to put peoples @name then follow it with his description and do tons of those all day. Same thing happens, if you peeps think it is yours and retweet it, then it goes to his belt or wallet.

I blocked him and reported him for spam.
Sometime later, I decided to go and retweet my friend @Sophinegiam, when I did a search on my tweetdeck I was shocked, the entire column was full top to bottom of the following:
(see twitpic) http://www.twitpic.com/2kp7jh
Had I retweeted one of those, it would go directly to HIS stupid belt or wallet!
Not all twitter accounts use the same name as their Etsy shop, so if the person was not aware, they may think that @Sophinegiam was the owner of that leather shop.
Most of the time we visit the links we retweet, but not always. If it looks like something we may not want or need, but that we would like to share, we just pass it along.
He has taken very good advantage of the system.

Tons of us have told him that this is wrong and to stop, but he just goes on and does it anyway, and to top it off, he goes and follows new shops and starts doing it to them!

I am trying to notify everyone I know that is a shop, I would love any help from others to do the same.
If you know anyone following him, or if you see anything like a "thank you" or a "FF" or "follow" then his name, please let your friends know.
It is an evil and horrible thing to do to people who work so hard to get page hits and make some money.

If you have previously blocked him but not reported as spam, he may still be able to do this to you.
I suggest that you follow him again, then unfollow, block, and report spam.
This seems to have worked for most of us.Please do the refollow-unfollow and block via the old standard twitter found by typing:
http://www.twitter.com/ then log in and do the follow and then unfollow and report as spam.
It appears that some of the other applications such as tweetdeck may not work to get you off of the lists.

Additionally - he has two lists, one for Etsy shops & one for Ebay shops.
If you are on any of these lists, please be sure to take the steps above to protect yourself.
The lists can be found here:
http://twitter.com/KSL01/etsy-users
http://twitter.com/KSL01/ebay-users  - UPDATE - EBAY SHOP LIST IS EMPTY!

Also there are a number of people that are FOLLOWING his list - I would also suggest that if you are following you unfollow the list.
I would not give him access to me in any way.
The ones who are following his list can be found here:
http://twitter.com/KSL01/etsy-users

How to UNFOLLOW LISTS -  if you find are following any of HIS lists - do the following:
Go to www.twitter.com find your "lists" on your template. On my template (the House one) it is on the right hand side just about half way down, it may be placed in a different spot on your template if you have changed the background. You may have to look for it.
Click on "view all" and you should get a page that has two tabs.
1. Lists following you
2. Lists you follow
I would make sure he is not on either of those lists, if you find that he is, block and REPORT HIM AS SPAM.
I am not positive what it would look like if you have not created ANY lists for yourself, however I would think that you should still see the "lists" link on the template. Click on it and you should still have a tab that says "lists you follow" if you are following any.

LASTLY:
After you have done all this work, I suggest that you post a tweet on twitter and go and see if it shows up on his page here:
http://twitter.com/KSL01/etsy-users
If you can see it there, HE can see it there.

Here is his Etsy shop to visit and see his hits and items.
http://www.etsy.com/shop/ksl1

You are all also welcome to post in the comments part this post, we can make  a list here, I will make add them to the bottom of this post and we can all try to make sure they are notified.
If you get a hold of them and they know, you can let me know and we can remove them back off.

I am hoping to look out for other Etsy, Bonanzle, Zazzle and other shops who work hard to try to get sales instead of freeloading and hijacking others work.

Thanks to everyone who have been helping me get the message out.
GG

UPDATE - STARTING LIST OF USERS WHO HIJACK TWEETS!
We have a new tweeter doing the same thing, I am going to start a list below, please block and report any tweeters on this list. I would suggest using the old standard twitter to block anyone you find on this list.
@KSL01
@RamiroSaez672

21 comments:

  1. I'm not affected by this thief, but I applaud your effort to make things right and to educate us at the same time.

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  2. Thanks so much for letting us know about this!!! I went through his page and my tweets and couldn't find anywhere he had done this 'directly' to me...It may have been much earlier than I searched. I DID block him though, because I certainly don't want it to happen, nor do I want to encourage the behavior that I see he's been doing to others!!!

    I generally make it a rule to check ALL links RTed and attributed to me anyway though. I'm going to continue doing that now, for sure!!

    That's kind of selfish and heartless when you realize that we're all trying to be visible here, and trying to be respectful of others!! I must say though, that someone else did this to me in the past. I blocked them too!!! It's very disrespectful behavior and should not be smiled at or tolerated! Thanks for warning all of us!

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  3. thanks for the heads up - much appreciated!

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  4. thanks for letting me know! What a jerk! I would never have noticed that!

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  5. Drives me nuts that people scam and are shady, dude should do his own work! I have blocked him from my tweets, thanks for the heads up!

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  6. Thank you so much for this! I wasn't following him, but he used my name, so I reported and blocked him.
    I'll send out more tweets about this!
    ByTheWay2

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  7. oh good grief - is there no end to the lengths people will go to? thanks for the warning.

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  8. I don't think he has used my tweets, but I did report him for spam, and tweeted this post out to my followers "ALERT! If U follow @KSL01 (etsy sellers) read this article! http://tinyurl.com/36w2q45 He hijacks your tweets to his shop not yours. BAD!!!"

    It brings people to your article here so hopefully more will find out. Why do people ned to cheat? There is plenty of business out there for honest sellers.

    Sandie
    ZaftigDelights.etsy.com
    KnitzyBlonde.etsy.com

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  9. Thanks, he did it to me and thanks to you I was able to stop it. I hope that if enough people report him as spam twitter will cancel his account. I am also not following back people who promise quick 10000 of followers. Thanks for watching out for us. Much Love :0)

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  10. OMG! Thank YOU so much for letting us know! I truly appreciate it. *hugs*

    You are amazing! My hero! :)

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  11. I can't stand spammers like this! Thank you sooo much for the heads up. I haven't checked his stream to see if it has happened to me but I know that I don't want it to happen! You're an angel for posting this!!

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  12. just a heartfelt thanks- he had hacked me and I'm not a huge Twitter gal nor a tech-y kinda gal so I never would have caught on without your help. I blocked at first through an application but after reading your post went and did it through Twitter.com- I think it's blocked now of all lists- followers etc... Thanks again. I'll retweet this to my followers and give them your blog link. Kisses and hugs- cathi

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  13. Wow.... WOW. Thanks so much for alerting us to this. I don't know if he hijacked any of my tweets, but I was on his list, so I blocked him just be be safe. I tweeted about your blog post, too.

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  14. Luckily I blocked him a while ago cos he was spamming my page with tweets I wasn't interested in thnks for this info tho hun :o) I've tweeted about it too xXx

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  15. thank you for letting me know! i have blocked this bugger and plan on taking action in stopping him from stealing people's tweets and spamming. grrr

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  16. thanks again for letting us all know. I've warned as many people as I come across. I mentioned to catcanpaint, but don't know if she's removed him yet. I noticed he was using her link pretty heavily.

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  17. Thank you for being so helpful and notify us of this!!!:) You're really cool!
    Mercedes

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  18. Thanks for the heads up! I blocked both of them and will also send your blog post along to my facebook friends. Will tweet about it also.

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  19. Thank you for the heads up! I noticed that KSL01 was doing this some time ago when he first started following me, but didn't realize how it affected my tweets. I unfollowed him and blocked him. I don't see the other one in my list.

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  20. He hasn't done it to me, but I appreciate you letting us know that this happens! I RT the blog post.
    Thanks,
    Tonya
    (TotallyToTheT on ArtFire, Etsy, Twitter, FB)

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