This is hardly the first time that class-action lawyers have been caught with fake plaintiffs.

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Once one of those readers realises that an account is a fake and notifies Twitter, Twitter can take action.

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Officials promised they would continue investigating the incidents and taking action to deal with fallout and make sure the fake Twittering is not repeated.

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The markets, when we spoke in mid-day and earlier in the morning, had all the earmarks of a market that was way oversold, and the action gave a lot of people - not only me - a huge head fake.

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