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Bots

Bots are automated programs that operate on the internet. They automate many communication tasks. This has led to the creation of an industry of bot providers.

Chatbots and social bots are programmed to mimic human interactions such as liking, commenting, and following. Bots have also been developed to facilitate social media marketing. Bots have led the marketing industry into an analytical crisis, as bots make it difficult to differentiate between human interactions and bot interactions. Some bots violate platforms' terms of use, which can result in bans and campaigns to eliminate bots categorically. Bots may even pose as real people to avoid prohibitions.

' Cyborgs '—either bot-assisted humans or human-assisted bots —are used for both legitimate and illegitimate purposes, from spreading fake news to creating marketing buzz. A common use claimed to be legitimate includes posting at a specific time. A human writes a post content and the bot posts it a specific time. In other cases, cyborgs spread fake news. Cyborgs may work as sock puppets, where one human pretends to be someone else, or operates multiple accounts, each pretending to be a person.