"Outrage over fake Jetstar Facebook page" - News Ltd

[anat0l]

To get on there as a fake Jetstar and tell this disempowered people you've cancelled their flights is absolutely disgusting.

You could say the pranksters were doing a favour: the less customers on Jetstar, the more Jetstar will be unsuccessful and the closer the airline will be to closing up. That would be music to a lot of people's ears here. Not to mention it will force those pax into giving rational thought into selecting another airline.

Not to mention its fraudulent, which is illegal.

That depends - it would require (the real) Jetstar to be able to tangibly show it had suffered some damage, I would think. Otherwise, it's "just a joke"; not to mention that if they ever did catch who did it (unlikely), they could always just plead that their intention was not malicious. That would be really hard to argue in court and would not be worth Jetstar's time and effort (not to mention a Phyrric victory if it did work).

Sure Jetstar might deserve this cough, but their customers (aka victims) do not.

Well... see above.

Certainly when most people here see complaints on Jetstar's Facebook page, they're usually thinking, "Well, you brought this on yourself by booking Jetstar," rather than having a thought for them.


My surprise in this is that this actually made the news. Must be a slow news day, really.

But as I said, this is way too easy to both do, and get away with. Suffice to say, it's also a lot more fun than a simple DDoS attack or the like.

 

[harvyk]

I don't see how they could have prevented it one way or the other..??

There is no way they can prevent it... One of the great things about the web is anyone can post up anything, one of the really terrible things about the web is that anyone can post up anything. Their best move would be find this / these people and go for the throat, and make the handing these people out to dry a public thing, whilst it won't prevent others from doing the same, it'll certainly provide a massive incentive not too.

A personal apology to each person affected plus a no strings attached voucher (eg an amount off your next flight) might even help JQ's image in the wake of this.

 

[dfcatch]

Dont make Facebook your main portal, versus an online forum hosted by JQ or whatever.

But that strategy still won't stop someone setting up a page like this dude.

Plus - How did people find the page - I'm guessing that they went looking on FB for JQ and that's what popped up.

By having less of an official presence - it makes it more likely that people would find the fake page.

I'm not sure that these people were "directed to FB" by JQ at all. If they went there by their own volition (my guess) - then there was nothing JQ could do to stop that.

(Unless the JQ website itself redirects "complaints/comments" to FB..??

 

[AaronBradford]

Plus - How did people find the page - I'm guessing that they went looking on FB for JQ and that's what popped up.

The fake JQ page posted in the comments of real posts on real JQ's page.

 

[anat0l]

Just shows that Facebook needs to do more to protect corporate brands and have for example Authorised Reps or something.

I don't see how Facebook needs to be an active agent in protecting corporate brands. They only provide the vehicle or platform for communication.

It's no different to someone registering a fake domain imitating Jetstar, making a complete bogus (or malicious) Jetstar website and hacking the main Jetstar URL in order to redirect people to the fake site. Or phishing emails for that matter. Or even DDoS attacks. Are we supposed to suggest that domain hosts, ISPs and email providers need to be active agents in protecting corporate brands, too?

 

[Fruitcake]

Plus - How did people find the page - I'm guessing that they went looking on FB for JQ and that's what popped up.

They posted their comments/queries/complaints on Jetstar's official Facebook page. Anyone can respond/comment to posting on a Facebook page - the problem was that rather than the official rep responding using the corporate account it was a rogue individual.

Just like I could make a copy of a moderator's profile pic on this site, give myself a similar user name (for example, call myself Lindsay Wi1son) and post on here, abusing people who ask naive questions.

Edit:
Mrs Australia can be found here:
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100004743191324&fref=ts


There also seems to be people planning a copycat attack - there's a few other profiles using the name 'Jetstar Australia' which have been registered since the story was published.

 

[markis10]

They posted their comments/queries/complaints on Jetstar's official Facebook page. Anyone can respond/comment to posting on a Facebook page - the problem was that rather than the official rep responding using the corporate account it was a rogue individual.

Just like I could make a copy of a moderator's profile pic on this site, give myself a similar user name (for example, call myself Lindsay Wi1son) and post on here, abusing people who ask naive questions.

You would not have a mod or rep tag though.

 

[anat0l]

Just like I could make a copy of a moderator's profile pic on this site, give myself a similar user name (for example, call myself Lindsay Wi1son) and post on here, abusing people who ask naive questions.

It'd be a lot harder to replicate the 'Moderator' rank (i.e. underneath your user name), as well as LW's post count, to make yours look 'authentic'.

True, if newbies don't pay attention to that information, they'll be equally fooled.

On Facebook, the fake account straight to the naked eye cannot be distinguished from the real one, and most users won't have the knowledge, time or bother to actually check if it were real.

In fact, those who checked out that the imposter was actually fake... I wonder what led them to go that way in the first place? After all, whilst it seems counter-intuitive that companies would post such outlandish responses to customers, it's not like it were exactly the first time it happened.

Of course, of more impressive value is if someone actually did hack into the Jetstar Australia Facebook page and posted garbage on their behalf. That would be even more difficult to track and recover from. It would not be outwardly impossible either since there is a good track record of Facebook accounts being hacked into (though usually this only results in private photos being stolen rather than imposters posting).

 

[markis10]

Are we supposed to suggest that domain hosts, ISPs and email providers need to be active agents in protecting corporate brands, too?

Yes, it is in fact required under the copyright and trade mark acts, just like Customs have an obligation under the same acts to seize imports of copyright/trademark material where there is an objection to its import!

Trade Marks and copyright - Notices of Objection

 

[Fruitcake]

You would not have a mod or rep tag though.

Agreed. But Mr and/or Mrs Australia on Facebook yesterday didn't have a corporate profile and still managed to cause confusion for a little while.

One solution would be for Facebook to make some sort of small mark on all posts by corporate profiles - perhaps presenting the name in italics or similar. That would at least raise the bar slightly (and as yourself and anat0l have noted, AFF effectively does this by presenting post count and 'rank').

 

[lovestotravel]

Facebook dont' really care about fake profiles

It allows them to say we now have another 200,000 members....

I have reported so many business pages that are as a "friend page" and not a "like" page

They are never removed!

 

[harvyk]

You would not have a mod or rep tag though.

True, but it would not be too hard to do this

<modhat>
Some fake moderator stuff
</modhat>

I doubt too many people would look to the fact that the moderator tag is missing.
Say something with enough authority, and ppl will probably believe you at face value.

 

[medhead]

There is no justification for what happened. It is fraudulent to get on and pretend you're Jetstar and to tell a customer their flight has now been cancelled.

As I already stated I laugh at those people but I do so as myself not in a way to cause them distress. That is the key difference. I also think it is a mistake to think the view of AFF about jetstar represents the view of the general public. Hence it is a fallacy to say that Jetstar needs to fail because AFF wants it to fail.

Finally, what happened is 2 "people" named Jetstar Australia started posting comments on the real Jetstar Australia page. There was not a fake Jetstar page. It was fairly easy to spot them as fakes, as I already outlined.


Sent from the Throne

 

[dfcatch]

They posted their comments/queries/complaints on Jetstar's official Facebook page. Anyone can respond/comment to posting on a Facebook page - the problem was that rather than the official rep responding using the corporate account it was a rogue individual.

Just like I could make a copy of a moderator's profile pic on this site, give myself a similar user name (for example, call myself Lindsay Wi1son) and post on here, abusing people who ask naive questions.

Edit:
Mrs Australia can be found here:
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100004743191324&fref=ts


There also seems to be people planning a copycat attack - there's a few other profiles using the name 'Jetstar Australia' which have been registered since the story was published.

ahh ok then......

In that case - I stand by my previous comments that the 'fake responses' were in fact relatively plausible in some peoples' eyes.

And I agree with Markis10's comments......

Avoiding FB/Twitter as Customer Service portals would avoid the problem.

 

[lovestotravel]

Avoiding FB/Twitter as Customer Service portals would avoid the problem.

It's really the best way to get a response as you can go on and on and on about it until you get what you want...

Our mate George on Jetstar's FB wall... He booked the wrong flight and it was everyone else's fault except his

He received the standard letter from Jetstar saying "bad luck, but sorry", however he kept going on and on and on and on about it on Jetstar's FB wall and eventually got a $50 credit to fly them again

Hours of work for a $50 JQ credit is not worth it by any means but he got what he wanted thanks to Social Media and the fact he kept going on and on and on

 

[dfcatch]

It's really the best way to get a response as you can go on and on and on about it until you get what you want...

Our mate George on Jetstar's FB wall... He booked the wrong flight and it was everyone else's fault except his

He received the standard letter from Jetstar saying "bad luck, but sorry", however he kept going on and on and on and on about it on Jetstar's FB wall and eventually got a $50 credit to fly them again

Hours of work for a $50 JQ credit is not worth it by any means but he got what he wanted thanks to Social Media and the fact he kept going on and on and on

So drop the social media strategy - and then there is no need to pander to this new age way of doing things.....


Of course - if your competitor seems to be more engaging - then an army of countless "Social Media Consultants" will tell you that you are missing out.

Personally - I have little time for this new "industry" - but it keeps agency chicks in jobs

 

[anat0l]

So drop the social media strategy - and then there is no need to pander to this new age way of doing things.....

That said, if Jetstar remove their Facebook page / social media engagement policies, that grants a carte blanche for anyone else to create fake pages / fake Twitter accounts.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using AustFreqFly

 

[harvyk]

So drop the social media strategy - and then there is no need to pander to this new age way of doing things.....

Social media is one of those necessary evils of the new world order. Yes you'll get social media experts stating this and that, and yet the majority of them their qualifications is limited to they signed up for a facebook account once.

Of course ignoring it holds it's own set of dangers these days, as you want to be the one in control of your companies social media, and you can bet your bottom dollar that if you are not the one in control, someone who may not have your best intentions at heart will control it for you, eg fake pages, fake profiles and when ppl no doubt search for your company, those are the only ones which will come up.

So it really becomes one of those "this will not earn you a cent, but if you don't play nicely with it this will bite..." things.

 

[lovestotravel]

Social media is the new way to advertise, I don't like it at all!

Hence Facebook starting to charge to promote updates for people/business

There are many companies that can't manager social media well and they may as well not be involved in it

You are either 100% involved or you shouldn't bother

 

[Aussie_flyer]

I thought it was hilarious. I find the Jetstar complaints on facebook really entertaining.