Twitch continues to grow in popularity, with more and more users flooding the streaming platform to broadcast their content or watch other streamers and engage with the community. As any social media platform though, numbers are everything, and Twitch has now identified and banned over 7 million bot accounts that were contributing to false statistics.
These statistics included both viewer and follower counts, known as viewer-botting and follower-botting respectively, whereby the bots controlled by a computer or script would increase these numbers making the stream/channel appear to have more engagement.
Fake engagement is described by Twitch as being “artificial inflation of channel statistics, such as views or follows, through coordination or 3rd party tools.”
The Twitch Support Twitter account highlighted this in a statement earlier today:
🛡️ We have been monitoring the rise of fake engagement on Twitch and have identified 7.5MM+ accounts that break our TOS by follow-botting and view-botting. We are taking action on these accounts and appreciate all of the reports about this issue.
— Twitch Support (@TwitchSupport) April 14, 2021
As a result of these removals, you may see sudden decreases in your follower and viewer count over the coming days. If you believe that you were follow- or view-botted, please check out our help article. đź“š https://t.co/R82r7NA90A
— Twitch Support (@TwitchSupport) April 14, 2021
Twitch provided a link to a support article that clarifies what botting and fake engagement is, noting that if the botting is not the fault of the user then they will not be banned. Along with the face that some users may see a drop in their follower count as a result of the bots being banned from the platform.
Recently, Twitch made new efforts to assist with curbing both on and off-platform harassment in an effort to help keep the community safe and in lines with Twitch’s TOS.
It would seem that the wild west of Twitch is no more, as what was once a platform known for all kinds of bizarre content and controversies over the years seems to be adopting more of an emphasis on providing a safer and more productive platform for its community.
What do you think about the new approaches that Twitch is taking? Is it better for everyone involved, or is it turning more into a regulated platform with strict rules?
About the Author
Justin White
He/Him
Justin is known for being the clown of any group and has spent his entire life playing and collecting video games. When he is not playing video games he is usually hanging out with his two American Staffies named Django and King (after Django Unchained characters) or his son Shia (yes, after Shia Labeouf).
