Facebook: Real Profiles vs. Fake Profiles

I’m sure it’d come as a surprise to almost no one that a countless number of Facebook profiles are fake, but to help put things into perspective, the folks over at Barracuda Networks did some research to see just how bad the problem has become. The company has also put together a simple infographic that might be worth “sharing” on your favorite social network, to help get the word out.

According to Barracuda’s research (gained from a rather small sampling (2,884) of profiles), a staggering 97% of fake profiles found on the popular social network identify themselves as female. Once again, this is likely to not come off as a surprise to many people, but 97% is still a much higher share than I would have guessed. That 97% is opposed to the 40% who are actually female (and real).

In a tie-in, 58% of female profiles which show themselves as bi-sexual are also deemed fake, in contrast to the 6% who actually state that preference and have a real profile. Next up: average number of friends. Real people have an average of 130 friends, while fake profiles have an average of 726 (I now have to question a good handful of my own Facebook over this finding!).

Here’s a kicker: real people tend to tag their photos once per four photos, whereas a fake profile will use 136 tags across the same number. Yeah, that might be a good hint right there. More fun facts at the URL below!