There are hackers out there who will, through “brute force” hack into an account.  These hackers usually attack people like Ashton Kutcher, Eric Stonestreet, and other high profile celebs.

For those of us not having to dodge papparazzi, tabloid reporters and entertainment television, we just have to take a few simple precautions, and be aware of a few steps and take a few precautions, in order to prevent MOST problems.

First thing, before anything else, follow the @Spam  and @support twitter accounts, so that you receive updates and suggestions from Twitter, on best practices and account security.

On Twitter, when you discover a spammer, phisher or a bot… you can block them, report them, or both.  (Because different Twitter interfaces have different instructions, you’ll have to learn “how” on your own.)

1) If you find you are mentioned in an @ message, from someone you don’t follow, with the enticement of a free IKEA Gift Certificate/Starbucks Card/IPad2/iPhone/whatever… Don’t click on it.  Just report the sender for spam, and block them.

2) If you get a DM (direct message) from a legitimate follower, who says to you: “Have you seen this bad blag that mentions you ?” and a link… Don’t click on it.  It will cause your account to be hacked.  To address this… first, note the twitter handle of the person sending the message… then, delete the message… and finally, send that person an @ message, telling them their account has been hacked, their password was compromised, and they need to change their password.  A good rule of thumb is: Unless someone sends you an @ message, telling you they are sending a DM message, NEVER CLICK ON A LINK IN A DM !!!

3) If you get a new follower who has few or no followers, often with a suggestive photo of a woman, often with a nonsensical user name (Michelle9f75n00()(), and often having a bio that says something like: “My parents don’t know I’ve had sex, but I like it a lot.  Please follow me” and a link. Don’t click on the link… just block and report the account for spam.

By following these few precautions, hopefully folks can use Twitter with less problems, and without the frustration and embarrassment of having to let everyone know their account has been hacked.  

See you on Twitter !!!

Whether “you” are your brand, or you work under a brand name, it is important to (as much as possible) retain control of the messages that come from your brand… or SEEM to come from your brand.

That may sound confusing, but for example, when I was starting, I knew I wanted to “work” under a name that I could obtain and control the .com and .ca domains, the Linked In user name, as well as the Twitter handle.  (At that time, you couldn’t reserve a Facebook URL.)

BobGray.com was (at that point) being held by someone from the “Committee to Elect Bob Gray as Governor“, so that wasn’t an option, although I DID pick up the BobGray.ca domain. (More on that, in another post.)

You can find out whether a domain is available, by doing a WHOIS search. https://register.ca/en/whois.php

After much debate, deliberation, and seeing what options were available, I settled on BobSongs as my brand, and went about reserving all the domains and social media user names.

Everyone has different preferences, but I like 000Domains for reserving ALL domains, except the .ca (Canadian) domains, which I reserve at Register.ca

(I believe that everyone should, as a matter of course, “protect” themselves, by reserving the domains associated with their name, their Brand and their children’s names.  If you don’t use them right away, you can “keep” a domain reserved, (it is called parking a domain,) so it is there when you want it.)

Once you have reserved the names, and you are ready to have a website or blog… you can either go about finding a webhost, switching the name servers, and designing your site… or hire someone to do this for you..