Beware of effective, deceptive Internet 'puppets'

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Trolls, shrills, also used to seek out users' IDs and email addresses
By Frank Ahrens
The Washington Post
Updated: 3:55 a.m. MT Oct 7, 2006

WASHINGTON - Beware the Internet's meat puppets. And sock puppets. And trolls and shills and astroturfing and other forms of dubious online marketing.

The Internet's power for the straightforward marketing of a product, service or personality is evident. But the Internet increasingly is being used to market products in ways designed to be opaque. Some schemes can compromise computer users' security; they live in the Internet's gray areas where savvy marketers can easily hide their identity and seek out naive or reckless users who willingly give up their e-mail addresses and other identification.

One popular marketing ruse is the meat puppet: a fictional person that passes as an actual human being online.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15163362/