On a Saturday in early July, an activist in the Occupy movement using the Twitter handle @darthmarkh posted a tweet with a picture of him getting chased by cops away from a BofA facility in New York. He had just been chalking up the bank’s sidewalk with protest slogans. After a few retweets by other Occupiers, BofA’s Twitter robot decided to step in. “I work for Bank of America. What happened? Anything I can do to help?” said one reply. Another read, “We are here to help, listen, and learn from our customers and are glad to assist with any account related inquiries.” Unfortunately for BofA, its Twitter algorithm failed to realize Occupy protesters weren’t looking for customer support.
