This is interesting.
A few weeks back, as part of my review of LinkedIn’s latest performance numbers, I noted that some LinkedIn members have raised concerns about the rising presence of fake profiles and engagement activity in the app, with a high number of LinkedIn members seemingly joining engagement “pods,” (coordinated comments and post activity) or using AI tools to post comments at scale.
LinkedIn told me that it is aware of these concerns, and that it is taking action to address engagement pods and automated engagement. In terms of specifics, LinkedIn said that it reduces the reach of such activity when detected.
And now, LinkedIn seems to be taking a stronger stand on this front.
In a new update to its overview of comments on posts in the app, LinkedIn has now added the second line in the following:
“To keep LinkedIn safe and professional, we may limit how many comments a member or a LinkedIn Page can make in a certain time period. Similarly, if we detect excessive comment creation or use of an automation tool, we may limit the visibility of those comments.”
So LinkedIn is now officially building this into its rules, as outlined in its documentation, that it will look to reduce the visibility of comments made via automation tools.
That’s a significant change, and while it may not seem like much, being just one extra line added to its documentation, the acknowledgment of automated activity being a problem is important, as is LinkedIn’s commitment to disincentivising such.
It’s another step towards combating fake engagement, which LinkedIn has noted is in violation of its Terms of Service. But the speculation has long been that maybe LinkedIn isn’t really interested in addressing such, because more activity looks better. And with the platform regularly seeing new “record levels of engagement,” the push to remove such activity, be it genuine or not, is seemingly not that high.
But again, LinkedIn has assured me that it is taking action on this. And while some of this activity is difficult for LinkedIn itself to enforce (given that it’s often coordinated off-platform), LinkedIn is aware of the engagement pod services that exist, which is another area it’s exploring.
Maybe, eventually, that could also see LinkedIn taking stronger action to address such, including legal enforcement, which it’s done in cases of data scraping and other misuse.
Either way, the fact that LinkedIn has now officially added this penalty to its official terms seems like a positive step.
