Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Paying Attention to the "Fine Print"?

Facebook, along with many other social networking sites, have had their fair share of scams. From getting users' personal information to making you believe that the site is shutting down. This, once again, is holding true for many Facebook users. They are coming across a message that is said to be from Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, stating that the site will shut down and if you are interested in keeping your account, to visit a listed website. This site takes you through the steps of "keeping your account". It makes you allow this application to the user's website. Like the other applications on Facebook, this one will post status messages or other content on the user's Wall. It begins by posting the same message that the user had fell for in the first place.

While this is happening, a completely bogus explanation for why Facebook will be shutting down is presented to the user. It explains that Facebook is becoming way too overpopulated and that there are too many people complaining that the website is becoming too slow. It also says that there are too many Facebook accounts that are not being used, and they are requiring everyone who is active on their account to verify this so that they don't shut down their account. The scam ends by providing a pop-up window of surveys to be completed, and once one is completed it is shown that the user's Facebook is active and will remain active.

Clearly, this is is a scam and the information that has been provided to users on Facebook are false. It is said that for every survey that is completed, to apparently keep your Facebook account, more money is put into these scammers' and hackers' pockets. If you are one of these people who had accepted this application onto your Facebook account, you are advised to delete everything from that application.

There has been word going around, ever since Facebook has been active, that its applications are not all valid. When you "Allow" for an application to access your account, you are sometimes allowing hackers to access your account information...not just to view your page. These things are sometimes easily mistaken for a cool game or a fun application, which is how the hackers grab a user's attention. More people just need to be on the look out for what is trying to really hack into their accounts.

Article Title: "Facebook closing all accounts" scam hits users
by Zeljka Zorz, HNS News Editor
http://www.net-security.org/secworld.php?id=10517

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