CyberCrimes on Facebook

Now that Facebook is IPO, this wont stop the cyber crimes on the internet. Rather it has create a way for criminals on live on stakeholders by investing their tactics on social media users. Through various kinds of identity theft, linkjacking spammers send messages containing false ads or even viruses to the victims, pretending to be a Facebook friend. Hackers get malware on your machine and get tens if not hundreds of thousands of these machines under their control and then they rent them out to spammers and others to monetize the personal information they steal. These rented accounts can then be used to advertise products illicitly or to request money from unsuspecting friends.

Here are ways criminals use Facebook;

1). Commandeering Accounts: commandeering occurs when the criminal logs on to an existing user account using an illegally obtained ID and password. Once they are online, they have the victim’s entire friend list at their disposal and a trusted cyber-identity. The impostor can use this identity for a variety of confidence schemes, including the popular, London scam in which the fraudster claims to be stranded overseas and in need of money to make it home.

2). Profile Cloning: Profile cloning is the act of using unprotected images and information to create a Facebook account with the same name and details of an existing user. The cloner will then send friend requests to all of the victim’s contacts. These contacts will likely accept the cloner as a friend since the request appears to be from someone they’re familiar with. Once accepted, the crook has access to the target’s personal information, which they can use to clone other profiles or to commit fraud. Hacking acumen is unnecessary to clone a profile; the criminal simply needs a registered account.

3). Phishing: Phishing on Facebook involves a hacker posing as a respected individual or organization and asking for personal data, usually via a wall post or direct message. Once clicked, the link infects the users’ computers with malware or directs them to a website that offers a compelling reason to divulge sensitive information. A classic example would be a site that congratulates the victims for having won $1,000 and prompts them to fill out a form with certain information to be confidential. 

4). Fake Facebook: A common form of phishing is the fake Facebook scam. The scammers direct users via some sort of clickable enticement, to a spurious Facebook log-in page designed to look like the real thing. When the victims enter their usernames and passwords, they are collected in a database, which the scammer often will sell. Once scammers have purchased a user’s information, they can take advantage of their assumed identity through apps like Facebook Marketplace and buy and sell a laundry list of goods and services. Posing as a reputable user lets the scammer capitalize on the trust that person has earned by selling fake goods and services or promoting brands they have been paid to advertise. 

5). Mining Unprotected Info: Few sites provide an easier source of basic personal information than Facebook. While it is possible to keep all personal information on Facebook private, users frequently reveal their emails, phone numbers, addresses, birth dates and other pieces of private data. As security experts and hackers know, this kind of information is often used as passwords or as answers to secret security questions. While the majority of unprotected information is mined for targeted advertising, it can be a means to more pernicious ends such as profile cloning and, ultimately, identity theft.

6).Spam: Not all spam — the mass sending of advertisements to users’ personal accounts — is against the law. However, the existence of Facebook and other social sites has allowed for a new kind of spam called clickjacking. The process of clickjacking, which is illegal, involves the hacking of a personal account using an advertisement for a viral video or article. Once the user clicks on this, the program sends an advertisement to the person’s friends through their account without their knowledge. 

So in a nutshell, be wary before you click on any link, like a post or comment or fill in information from a link redirected from Facebook. Always think security not about yourself but those of your friends.