Creating Fake Identity and Pseudo Accounts on Social Media Among University Students in North Cyprus

ABSTRACT: The study investigates the attitudes of international university students in Turkish Republic of North Cyprus through users’ creation fake identity on social media. This study aims to know if Facebook users check accounts if they are fake before they accept friend request, how Facebook users identify accounts as fake, if most Facebook active users create fake identity and create hyper real image of themselves. This study also seeks to know how users perceive other people who create fake identity on Facebook and if there is a statistical significant difference as to how male and female students perceive other people who create fake identity on Facebook. Through a survey conducted among seven hundred and sixty-seven international university students in Turkish Republic of North Cyprus; two hundred Eastern Mediterranean University students, one hundred and ninety-nine Near East University students, one hundred and ninety-two European University of Lefke and one hundred seventy-six Girne American University students enrolled in Fall 2017/2018 session. Results show that majority of the respondents agree to a very great extent that they check any account if its fake once they get a friend request. Results also show that respondents agree that they believe that an account is fake when it has exaggerated biography, profiles without photo, accounts with no mutual friends, mutual friends but any of mutual friends knows the person, accounts with few friends (i.e. 10-15 friends), empty timeline (No sharing) and extremely gorgeous human photo (beautiful/handsome). Results show that most respondents don’t create fake account and create hyper-real image of themselves. Results show that when respondents were asked how they perceive users who create fake identity, many respondents agree that they view people who create fake identity on Facebook as fraudsters, people who suffer from poverty of ideas, with low self esteem, inferiority complex, high level of insecurity, who wants to be acceptable by the society and attention seekers. Keywords: Social media, Facebook, Pseudo accounts, Hyper-real image, fake identity.