Political

David Cameron’s Twitter account followed ‘high-class escorts’

Ooops:

Prime Minister David Cameron appeared to accidentally follow a high-class escort agency on Twitter.

Number 10 told the BBC the account had been followed due to an automated system they had in place in 2009. It said it was in the process of unfollowing “inappropriate” accounts.

Carltons of London’s website said it offered the “finest London escorts to gentlemen of distinction”…

Number 10 told the BBC the following was unintentional.

“Prior to 2010, an auto-follow process was used, meaning that @Number10gov automatically followed anyone who followed the account.

“This was common practice at the time for many corporate accounts, but was discontinued in 2009.

“As a result of this legacy, the @Number10gov account follows almost 370,000 accounts and we have taken steps to un-follow as many as possible that are inactive, spam or inappropriate. This work is ongoing.”

That’s a pretty fair explanation – and it’s certainly true more widely that the fashion for following everyone back has changed rather as Twitter has grown. If you want your Twitter stream to be useful, then you need to be much more selective in who you follow.

Even if you don’t (and I doubt how much the Twitter stream for the Prime Minister’s account is looked at), there is still the risk that by following back dodgy accounts you either cause hassle for yourself (as with this story) or give accounts an implicit endorsement that would you rather not have given.

UPDATE: And a similar problem has befallen Nick Clegg’s Twitter account.

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