The bot-and-grift glossary: every term in this series, in one place

Some of these words get thrown around online long before anyone explains what they actually mean. This page is the fast version — one clear definition per term, plus a link to the full post if you want the research behind it.

Bot — Loosely, any account whose posting or interaction is automated or semi-automated rather than typed live by the person it claims to be. See how much of X is actually bots for why even this basic count is contested.

Retweet amplifier — An account that rarely posts anything original, existing almost entirely to repost the same handful of posts to manufacture the appearance of popularity. Full post.

Reply farm — An account that replies constantly to high-visibility posts for visibility by volume, while getting almost no genuine engagement back. Full post.

24/7 scheduler — An account with no recognizable sleep gap in its posting — active at every hour, every day. Full post.

Broadcast operator — An account posting at high volume with almost no real two-way engagement, shaped like a media account without an actual publisher behind it. Full post.

Grift funnel — An account that exists purely to move a real person from your feed to a link — a crypto pitch, an affiliate scheme, a scam. Full post.

LLM-assisted account — An account whose replies are generated or heavily polished by a language model. Full post, plus a 2025/2026 update on how fast this pattern has grown.

Coordinated inauthentic behavior / coordinated campaign — Multiple accounts posting the same or near-identical content within a tight window of time. Full post.

Astroturfing — The broader tactic coordinated campaigns are usually in service of: manufacturing the appearance of organic agreement using accounts all directed by the same operator.

Follow-for-follow growth account — An account that inflates its follower count by following an enormous number of others, betting some percentage follow back. Full post.

Sockpuppet — An account identity, sometimes one of several controlled by the same operator, built specifically to deceive. Full post.

Bought / repurposed account — A real, aged account that goes quiet and then resumes activity under new management, valuable because its age skips new-account scrutiny. Full post.

Fake-location persona — An account whose stated location doesn't match the timezone its actual posting hours suggest. Full post.

Template reply spammer — An account cycling through a small set of generic phrases posted as replies under unrelated content. Full post.

Click farm / bot farm — The physical or human infrastructure behind fake engagement at scale. Full post.

Follower audit — The practice of checking your own follower list for these same patterns. Full post.

If a term you've heard isn't here, it's probably because it's newer than this list. Worth bookmarking this page and checking back, or starting from the no-tools checklist if you're trying to judge one specific account right now.