Are you Dating a Bot?
How to tell if it's real…
Computers are relatively new inventions, with the first (ENIAC) made about 80 years ago. Compared to the rest of human existence of about 300,000 years, we are still in the early stages of this new technological age. The technology was used to advance significantly, very slowly, until fertilizer was invented and the world could support larger populations; plus, less time farming meant more time spent discovering new things. That eventually led to the Industrial Revolution, which was only 300 years ago and is recent in human history. Then, with the invention of the computer, internet, social media, and AI all in the past 80 years, we are advancing faster than ever. Now, some groundbreaking discoveries are happening every day.
As Social Media and Programs develop more and more, there are things you have to look out for. Robots or ‘bots’ have been used for telemarketing and different phishing scams since the late 80s, but they are only getting more advanced as technology and programs improve. Now, we are in the age of social media bots. They plague almost every platform you use, from Twitter to text to email. Understanding if you are talking to a bot is essential to avoid being scammed. As more and more of our personal lives start on the internet and social media, and the bots get more advanced, how would you know if you were dating a robot?
In What Instances Would This Occur?
You may interact with hundreds of different platforms, websites, and posts throughout the day. It is hard to say where and when you might interact with a bot. Generally, they are on many social media platforms, including Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok, Facebook, Linkedin, Fiverr, etc.. Of course, though, these are only the major ones; many smaller social apps may have more or less prevalence of bots, but generally speaking, these are the main ones. If you’re talking about dating, it would mainly be Tinder, Bumble, Hinge, and OkCupid.
Spotting a robot on other social media apps and sites can be more challenging. You may interact with one if someone you don’t know reaches out to you randomly, or you may interact with one designed to create conflict in a comment section. You match with other people when it comes to dating apps and sites. Matching allows you to exchange messages with the other ’person.’ This would be the only time you can interact with a potential robot. Unlike other social media apps, dating only allows you to interact with people you match. If you swipe left, they are eliminated from your feed, and it can be hard to find them again. Bots can use ‘catfish’ (pictures designed to get your attention) profile pictures to get around this.
How do you tell if you are talking to a robot?
When talking to ‘someone’ online, there are certain things that you can look for that can show if you are talking to a robot or not. None of these are 100% dead giveaways that you are talking to a robot. You can never be sure. There may be bots so convincing that you never think twice about whether they are or not, but there also may be people who may have all the evidence of being a robot, just regular people. In general, though, robots have specific ways of doing things that can show you that they are not human.
One of the significant things to look for is account activity. Robots don’t have to go to work or sleep, so you may find that they post things during unusual hours of the day or post many things in rapid succession. Things that wouldn’t be normal for a regular human to do. You may also notice that the posts or replies of a particular user are very similar. If this is a robot, it would be because it only has a programmed series of responses it can give, and if prompted to provide those responses repeatedly, it would output the same thing. Bots also generally do not pick up on context clues very quickly. This could include sarcasm or jokes. A good test to see if someone is a bot is to ask them a question regarding some context and see how they respond.
Regarding dating apps, things can be different from regular social media apps. However, everything previously explained still applies to dating apps, and everything different about dating apps still applies to regular social media. A good general rule when navigating these apps is only to send or do something online or on another site once you meet up with the person.
First, if you match with someone on a dating app, and it all seems too good to be true, it probably is. Many bots may use ‘catfish’ techniques to get your attention. So, if you find something that looks like that, it is best to proceed cautiously. Also, many bots on dating apps talk to many people at once, so they tend to move fast. If you match with someone and they seem to send messages extremely fast, that is a red flag for a bot. It is also best to watch out for scams. Not all bots scam, but many do. They might ask for money or for you to join a website to steal your personal information.
Example of what a social media bot’s code may look like:
Many different types of bots are used for many different reasons, so there is no definitive answer as to what one’s code looks like; however, multiple videos and tutorials online can help you create one.
A person can make a Twitter bot that automatically tweets any image and text they want through Python. This one is simple and helpful for someone who wants to create more of a spam or troll bot (robots designed to create division and mistrust) that uses a little more context and can automatically make realistic responses without user intervention. However, this basic example will work for this case because you can branch off into many different types of bots from here.
How will this technology develop in the future?
With recent breakthroughs in artificial intelligence technology, social media bots will change and evolve to become more advanced. A.I. can adapt its answers to context much quicker than a bot with regular programs and pre-determined answers. Not only that, but the accessibility of it goes through the roof. Anyone desiring to create a social media bot can build one way more advanced than the previous non-AI. Social media bots quickly and easily. This will make it harder to spot bots; you probably won’t know if you are talking to one.
A.I. will affect social media. Artificial intelligence will enhance personalization by analyzing “vast amounts of user data” and creating and curating content based on your interests. This means social media bots can also do that but are becoming indetectable. Despite the extreme personalization and the ability of A.I. to curate a specific context, there are still ways to tell the difference between a real person and an A.I. bot.
A.I. is prone to make mistakes. If you have ever used an open A.I. platforms such as Chat GPT or microsoft’s copilot then you probably know that A.I. can give you false information, also, artificial intelligence is not very good at thinking deeply and philosophically. If you ask the A.I. a question based on a fact or something, such as: When did the Berlin Wall come down? It will probably give you the correct answer because it’s based on a fact, just like if you were to look it up on the web. But if you ask a more profound question, you might find it explaining something that makes no sense or over-explaining an answer. One possible issue for this is that artificial intelligence can learn from its mistakes, meaning it will only get more and more advanced and gain the ability to answer these questions better.
Final Thoughts
As programs and technology advance, the danger of bots and scams increases, too. As our lives become increasingly dependent on technology, it’s essential to understand if you are talking to a real person. Bots are active on many platforms, mainly social media platforms and sites such as Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Twitter. Due to bots programming and lack of context clues, there are some things that you can look out for when talking to other people to make sure that they are not robots. This includes being weary of account activity, messages that seem auto-generated, and outside links or sources.
With more advanced technology, it can become nearly impossible to distinguish between real people and robots. This is due to the incredible ability of A.I. to adapt its answers to context and analyze a vast amount of user data.
Pay attention to the signs before visiting another site or agreeing to do something online.
