The new team will investigate reports and build systems that detect, remove and prevent spam. The company plans to remove fake and ‘spammy’ accounts after numerous suspicious accounts were found.

The initiative will make sure followers are real people are interest. The company says the removal of spam followers will cause 99% of Pinterest accounts to lose fewer than 10 followers.

Pinterest, however, says that most of the fake accounts are following a small number of legitimate accounts.

"Like all online services, getting rid of spam on Pinterest is an ongoing process. In this case, we’ve used everything we’ve learned from these spam accounts to implement new measures that will help keep bad accounts from being created in the first place," said Marty Weiner, engineering manager at Pinterest.

Pinterest spam

The company is encouraging users to report whenever anything seems suspicious on the site.

Pinterest recently launched corporate tools for organisations to create official accounts on Pinterest’s new business site.

Organisations which already have existing accounts on Pinterest can convert them to an account on the business site.

The business portal will feature case studies, guides and best practices to help businesses get the most out of their Pinterest business account.

Pinterest plans to release future services to help provide businesses with ways to reach and understand their Pinterest audience.

The US based startup raised a hefty $100m in funding earlier this year from Japanese eCommerce giant, Rakuten, placing the company’s valuation at more than $1bn.

 

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