IF YOU thought sock puppets were made merely for the amusement of small children, think again. In cyberspace, a sock puppet is a vandal’s alter ego, an additional account that they use to pose as a different user and tamper with facts and dishonestly promote alternative viewpoints.
First used maliciously on internet message boards in the mid-1990s, sock puppets are the flip side of one of the web’s great triumphs – collaboration between people anywhere in the world. Since then, a type of website known as a wiki has evolved, with the aim of promoting collaborations and knowledge-sharing. Anybody can…
