Random Rants by KC: TinEye

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

How to spot fake profiles on LinkedIn

Five areas of problems that would indicate a fake profile (or a badly written one)

Photo Problems

Photo problems are with the profile photo itself.

Photos that seem to be way too professional... or UN-professional

Photos that are too "posed" are clearly suspect. Use TinEye.com on it and you can often find where it was lifted from.

ex: that photo of "Jessica Trot" to the right... Is that a pose a professional would show people? TinEye revealed that this is actually an amateur model in Russia who's not afraid to show a bit more skin than that picture.

Obvious Stock Photo

I've seen profile pics that still have the stockphoto website watermark
Clearly implausible photo

ex: Julia Cute claims to be from Pakistan, but "her" picture is obviously Chinese
Obvious Star Photo

Many fake profiles used movie stars, TV stars, sports stars, and more

Read the whole thing at

http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-spot-fake-profiles-on-LinkedIn-and-other-social-networking-sites

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Scambusting Through Internet: Reverse Image Search

Image via WikipediaWhen a photo arrives with a description, how do you know if it's really the item / event being illustrated?

You use Reverse Image Search, such as TinEye.com

Let's say someone forwarded you a picture of the most beautiful prison you've ever seen. It's a new SuperMAX prison for the ultra-rich, the e-mail claimed. Is it true?

The correct answer is "it's a prison, but it's NOT in the US". It's actually an Austrian detention center.

TinEye would have given you the link, and a click would have taken you to a blog entry which identified the REAL place.

However, this can also used to identify picture pirates, who stole / copied pictures without attribute. Scam websites often fill their website with stolen stock photos in order to look somewhat professional.

Do NOT steal pictures blindly on the Internet. People WILL find out.