Problems with securing online identity raised again
The BBC programme Click online reports today on a security flaw in the Facebook website. Many users enjoy adding the many third-party games, quizzes and other applications that are available within Facebook, from Scrabble-type games to movie quizzes to ways to turn your friends into zombies. The BBC’s Click reporters have shown how they could create a Facebook application which looked ostensibly like a harmless fun application but in fact downloaded the user’s personal details AND all their friends’ personal details.
Whether this would be enough for someone’s identity to be stolen would depend on how much information they made available on their profile – but privacy settings would have no effect on this malicious code because you don’t even have to accept the application – you just have to be a friend of someone who has, and your friends have access to all your details.
I have already stopped installing new Facebook applications. I will also look once again at the kind of information I make available on the Web.
Do you give your real birthdate on Facebook or any other site? Will you be looking again at what information you give out?
Originally published on reachfurther.com