Study Finds Almost Half of PS5 Disc Backlash Came from Fake Accounts

A piece of research published by Cyabra reveals that almost half of the replies to official PlayStation channels highlighting August’s blackout campaign were “inauthentic” — or, in other words, fake.

In the wake of its decision to stop manufacturing physical games in 2028, fans mobilised to launch a boycott at the end of August, encouraging players to disconnect their consoles and stay offline.

The aim was to reduce Sony’s monthly active users and spending within the PlayStation ecosystem, hitting the company where it hurts.

However, data from the US found there was no real impact on the firm’s engagement statistics, and while PlayStation’s financial report is still awaited to fully verify this, this new research has now emerged.

Cyabra published its findings in September, but it has only just been picked up by the wider Internet.

In its research, it says it was able to identify almost 1,000 fake profiles that added to the “noise” and spammed official PlayStation accounts with automated posts.

These fake profiles generated over 1 million views and were shared more than 100,000 times. Misspelled variants, such as #NoDiskNoBuy, were almost 90% amplified by bots, according to the research.

It is not all bad for protestors, however: Cyabra notes that those posts with the most engagement did come from genuine, authentic posters. It says “28% of the key posts [on the topic] came from accounts with fewer than 5,000 followers”, and simply went viral by reflecting the mood of players.

If you look at any PlayStation post from the past couple of months, you will see people mentioning physical games in the replies, but the sentiment is fading and the bot accounts are attracting a lot less engagement now.

It is interesting to see this new era of “social media warfare” play out, though, and it is hardly surprising to see the blackout seemingly stumble if it was significantly boosted by fake accounts.

I think it is important to underline that none of this research says there aren’t people deeply unhappy with Sony’s decision — it is just fascinating to see the extent to which the conversation is being driven by bots.