Problem with Facebook

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Tragic Typos said:
Why don't we just ban the Internet. That will solve all of our problems.
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common response from the blind who refuse to listen to reason or truth.

Light of Heaven said:
I guess FB is popular in it's usage that it's all people talk about. Don't forget, there are other avenues for fitnah. FB is fitnah, for sure but are people really oblivious to its negatives? Not really...
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You are welcome to do as you please. This thread is for everyone to see the ills of FB. Like alcohol, there is little good in it but the evil out weighs more than good but people either are ignorant of it or choose to be blind to it.

Oh God, will this never end. Once upon a time there were other social networking sites...
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There is potential of evil use in everything. FB has lot more issues then other sites, issues related to privacy, people behind the sites working with intelligence agencies and the sheeples foolishly updating their databases for them.


MySpace: 90,000 Sex Offenders Purged From Web Site

February 04, 2009

RALEIGH, N.C. — About 90,000 sex offenders have been identified and removed from the social networking Web site MySpace, company and law enforcement officials said Tuesday.

The number was nearly double what MySpace officials originally estimated last year, said North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper, who along with Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal has led efforts to make social networking Web sites safer for young users.

Cooper said he wasn't surprised by the updated numbers, and demanded that MySpace and rival online networking site Facebook — which claim to have more than 280 million users combined — do more to protect children and teenagers.

"These sites were created for young people to communicate with each other. Predators are going to troll in these areas where they know children are going to be," Cooper said. "That's why these social networking sites have the responsibility to make their sites safe for children."

The attorneys general received agreements last year from MySpace and Facebook to push toward making their sites safer.

Both sites implemented dozens of safeguards, including finding better ways to verify user's ages, banning convicted sex offenders from using the sites and limiting the ability of older users to search members under 18.

Blumenthal, who received MySpace's updated numbers Tuesday through a subpoena, said the information "provides compelling proof that social networking sites remain rife with sexual predators."

A preliminary number of sex offenders found on Facebook was "substantial," but he said the company has yet to respond to a recent subpoena.

MySpace executives said they were confident in the technology they use to find, remove and block registered sex offenders.

The company uses Sentinel SAFE, a database it created in 2006 with the names, physical descriptions and other identifiable characteristics of sex offenders that cross-references against MySpace members.

"Sentinel SAFE is the best industry solution to ensure these offenders are removed from social networks," Hemanshu Nigam, the company's chief security officer, said in a statement Tuesday.

MySpace has more than 130 million active users worldwide.

A spokesman for Facebook, which claims more than 150 million active users (currrently 350 million), said Tuesday that protecting its users has always been a priority.

"We have a policy prohibiting registered sex offenders from joining Facebook," said spokesman Barry Schnitt. "We are glad to be able to report that we have not yet had to handle a case of a registered sex offender meeting a minor through Facebook. We are working hard to make sure it never happens."

Still, Cooper said more should be done.

"Technology moves forward quickly, and it's important for these companies to stay ahead of the technology," he said. "And they're not moving fast enough for us."

The push for better restrictions came during a time when social-networking Web sites were seeing exponential growth, with most of it coming in the form of younger users. But along with the younger members came sexual predators who would lie about their age to lure young victims.

Blumenthal and Cooper, who co-chair the State Attorney General Task Force on Social Networking, have led the charge for tougher restrictions to be placed on who joins online social-networking sites.

The Internet Safety Technical Task Force report, commissioned by the attorneys general in 2008, researched ways to help squash the onslaught of sexual predators targeting younger social-networking clients.

Enhancing Child Safety & Online Technologies, a report by the task force submitted to attorneys general in December, noted was no surefire way to guarantee online child safety.

The task force also played down fears of Internet sexual predators who target children on social-networking sites. While citing other dangers such as online bullying, the panel said cases of predators typically involved youths well aware they were meeting an adult for sexual activities.

But Cooper said the danger posed by sexual preditors online remains.

"Our law enforcement officers investigating these cases tell us that predators are soliciting children on the Internet and in social networking sites," Cooper said. "We're working to provide more law enforcement to protect our kids, but social networking sites and technology companies must do their part as well."


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Officials: 29,000 Registered Sex Offenders on MySpace

July 25, 2007

RALEIGH, N.C. — MySpace.com has found more than 29,000 registered sex offenders with profiles on the popular social networking Web site — more than four times the number cited by the company two months ago, officials in two states Tuesday.

North Carolina's Roy Cooper is one of several attorneys general who recently demanded the News Corp. -owned Web site provide data on how many registered sex offenders were using the popular social networking site, along with information about where they live.

After initially withholding the information, citing federal privacy laws, MySpace began sharing the information in May after the states filed formal legal requests.

At the time, MySpace said it had already used a database it helped create to remove about 7,000 profiles of sex offenders, out of a total of about 180 million profiles on the site.
Cooper's office said Tuesday, however, that now the figure has risen past 29,000.

"I'm absolutely astonished and appalled because the number has grown so exponentially over so short of time with no explanation," said Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, who also had pressed the company earlier for sex offender data.

MySpace declined to comment on the figure, focusing instead on its efforts to clean up its profile rolls.

"We're pleased that we've successfully identified and removed registered sex offenders from our site and hope that other social networking sites follow our lead," MySpace chief security officer Hemanshu Nigam said in a prepared statement.

Cooper is pushing for a state law that would require children to receive parental permission before creating social networking profiles, and require the Web sites to verify the parents' identity and age.

For example, social networking sites would have to compare information provided by a parent with commercial databases. Sites could also force parents to submit credit cards or printed forms.

Cooper is working with law enforcement officials in other states in pressuring MySpace to use age and identity verification methods voluntarily.

Based on media reports, Cooper's office found more than 100 criminal incidents this year of adults using MySpace to prey or attempt to prey on children.

Most recently, a Virginia man pleaded guilty Monday to kidnapping and soliciting a 14-year old girl he met on MySpace.

"All we're doing is giving parents the right to make a choice whether their children can go online," Cooper told a state House committee considering the bill on parental involvement and verification.

He said the measure would lead to "fewer children at risk, because there will be fewer children on those Web sites."

Advocates for Internet companies and privacy issues testified against the proposed restrictions, saying the broad parental verification standards would be found unconstitutional because they prohibit free speech or impede interstate commerce.

The experts who testified also said Cooper's idea isn't foolproof, because children could fabricate their parents' information and purported consent.

The parental verification requirement "makes promises to consumers that cannot be kept. It is dangerous language," said Emily Hackett, executive director of the Washington-based Internet Alliance, whose clients include Time Warner Inc.'s (TWX) AOL, Yahoo Inc. (YHOO) and VeriSign Inc. (VRSN ) "There is no way to eyeball a user."

The bill has already passed the North Carolina Senate. Now it goes to a House subcommittee for more consideration.

State Sen. Walter Dalton, a Democrat who is a primary sponsor of the bill, acknowledged that it won't stop all sexual predators from getting on social networking sites. But he said it addresses a problem that shouldn't be ignored, Dalton said.

"There is obviously a compelling state interest to protect our children from sexual predators," he said.

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Mom, Sex Offender Sentenced in Teen Girl Sex Case

July 23, 2007

MOUNT CLEMENS, Mich. — A man who had sex with a 14-year-old girl with her mother's permission was sentenced Monday to up to 15 years in prison.

Macomb County Circuit Court Judge Matthew Switalski sentenced 21-year-old Christopher M. Garcia to six to 15 years on each of two counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct. Garcia also was sentenced to two to four years for failing to register as a sex offender.

Sentences for each of the charges will run at the same time.

Garcia pleaded guilty to the charges June 25.

The girl is pregnant for a third time and living in foster care. Police said she had two earlier miscarriages.

Prosecutors say her 35-year-old mother let Garcia have sex with the girl in their home in the Detroit suburb of Utica. Another man, James E. Przeadzki, also had sex with her daughter's 14-year-old friend in the home, authorities say.

Przeadzki, 21, pleaded guilty June 14 to assault with intent to commit sexual penetration. He was sentenced to nine months in jail and three years' probation.\\

The girl's mother received two years' probation after pleading guilty May 24 to misdemeanor child abuse.

Her daughter was 13 when she fled to Indiana last year with another man she met on the popular MySpace.com. She claimed she was 18 in her Internet postings and the man was not charged.

[url]http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,290408,00.html[/URL]
 
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Light of Heaven said:
^^I've said this repeatedly in the past but only get mocked for that statement lol. Whatever :/
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Well, that's sad. It's true - just be on your guard. Facebook is for people you KNOW, not people you want to meet or hook up with, as in many cases.
 
Well does it specifically say that? lol. I wouldnt know. Same for any other thing where you come across people...be on your guard..no offense but on this forum too. Doesnt matter how proper this place is..you dont know whos lurking behind that screen.
 
Data mining and social networks

Story by Mark Whitehorn, 28-07-2009

At what point does our data become information that belongs to the social networking site we've placed it on?

Last month I tried to convince you that for the first time in history it is possible to analyse in great detail how people interact socially. The Facebooks and Bebos of this world are essentially large databases that record how people interact, so they are eminently amenable to analysis in manifold ways. As an example, it is possible to identify individuals or classes of individual who have significantly more influence on their peers than normal. Such people are clearly a much more cost effective target for advertisers than average members of the general public.

There are many other examples so it is clear that the social networking sites are goldmines ripe for data mining (or perhaps datamines ripe for gold mining.) However, of course, this couldn’t ever happen in practice - could it? Surely there are all sorts of protections in place and the social networking sites are not able to sell the data they hold… are they?

Sadly this is already the source of considerable controversy. In late 2007 Facebook proudly announced Beacon to the world. Beacon essentially tracked a member’s purchases on other sites and pushed that information to friends of the member. Within a month Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook’s Founder and CEO) had to issue an apology and since then the company has been dogged by concerns about how it is using data.

From my point of view (as one who is not so interested in privacy as in the relationship between data and information) the concerns expressed so far seem to have skirted a more fundamental issue. At what point does our data become information that belongs to the social networking site?

Consider a generic Social Networking Site called SNS. It runs a data mining algorithm on its database and uncovers the fascinating information that males who:
  • are 25 years old
  • earn more than £30K
  • party more than once a month
  • have fewer than three female friends
are very, very likely to buy a sports car within three months.

If SNS supplies this finding (without any personal details) to a car manufacturer has it supplied personal data in breach of confidentiality? I would argue (as a database person, not a barrister) that this information belongs to SNS so there is no breach.

Now let’s make it slightly more controversial. Suppose SNS does the same but supplies a list of those individuals complete with contact details. In one sense all SNS has done is to filter the list of all its users (say, 100 million) into a list of, say, 5,000. SNS can argue that it has simply used its own information to filter data that is already in the public domain. Or we can argue that our privacy has been violated. I don’t pretend to know how the law would see this, but I do think these are interesting questions.

[url]http://www.server-management.co.uk/viewpoints/Data_mining_and_social_networks[/URL]
 
Activists hijack Facebook groups 'to expose holes'

11/11/2009

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - – Activists claimed to have seized control of nearly 300 Facebook community groups in a self-proclaimed effort to expose how vulnerable online reputations are to tampering.

A group called "Control Your Info" (CYI) claimed credit for commandeering 289 Facebook groups, saying it was simple to get into poorly-protected administrative settings at the website.

"This is just one example that really shows the vulnerabilities of social media," said a blog post at controlyour.info.

"If you chose to express yourself on the Internet, make sure the expressions are your own and not a spammers. This isn't some kind of scare tactic, nor is it a hack, it's a feature that can be used, and is being used, in bad ways."

CYI claimed its motives were pure and that the move was more of a "take-over" than a computer hack of Facebook groups.

Facebook Groups are themed chat venues that users of the social networking service can join to socialize online with people who share interests.

"Facebook Groups suffer from a major flaw," said a message on the CYI blog.

"If an administrator of a group leaves, anyone can register as a new admin. So, in order to take control of a Facebook group, all you really have to do is a quick search on Google."

Once CYI accessed groups as administrators it had authority to change anything, including pictures, descriptions and settings.

CYI fired off messages to the groups telling them they had been "hijacked" and the justification for the attacks. CYI rechristened each group with its name and logo.

CYI promised to restore the violated groups to their original conditions after it makes its point.

"Our main goal is to draw attention to questions concerning online privacy awareness," CYI said. "People have even lost their jobs over Facebook content. We wanted to do something about this."

Facebook said there was no hacking involved and there was no confidential information at risk.

The groups targeted had been abandoned by their owners, which left doors open for group members to make themselves administrators.

"Group administrators have no access to private user information and group members can leave a group at any time," Facebook said.

"In the rare instances when we find that a group has been changed inappropriately, we will disable the group, which is the action we plan for these groups."

http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20091111/ttc-us-it-internet-crime-facebook-0de2eff.html


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Beware Facebook 'Friends' Who Trash Your Laptop

The message that popped into Laurie Gale's Facebook inbox last month seemed harmless enough — a friend had seen a video of her and had sent a link so she could view it.

January 30, 2009

The link led to a video site that prompted her to update her video software, which she did.

"Within seconds, everything started shutting itself down," says Gale, a 37-year-old lamp-works artist from Versailles, Ky.

Gale's new Dell Inspiron laptop had been infected with malicious software, or malware, that has spread through social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace.

"I cried for an hour," Gale says. It took a trip to the local computer repair shop and several phone calls with Dell customer-service representatives for her to restore the computer to its factory settings. "It was three days of torture."

The popularity of social networks and social media sites has grabbed the attention of cyber crooks searching to pilfer passwords, called "phishing," and steal sensitive personal information.

The hackers are exploiting users' sense of safety within these sites, says Pat Clawson, chief executive of Lumension Security, a computer security company.

Earlier this month, Twitter, a social site in which users communicate in short bursts of text, was hit in a campaign to steal users' account passwords. On business-networking site LinkedIn, criminals set up fake celebrity profiles that, when visited, downloaded malware onto users' machines.

​
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,485925,00.html?sPage=fnc/scitech/cybersecurity

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The Downside of Friends: Facebook's Hacking Problem

By Claire SuddathTuesday, May. 05, 2009


You get a quick message from a friend on Facebook, click on the link and absentmindedly log in to a website pretending to be Facebook. This is what happened last week, when scammers unleashed a new attack on Facebook, collecting users' log-in information and passwords and pilfering victims' "friends" lists to target the next dopes. Listen up, people: Although Facebook has a reputation for Internet security — it identified the scam within hours, and the ripple effects only lasted for a couple days — at 200 million members and counting, the size and popularity of the social-networking site has made it the object of increasing attention from hackers and spammers. And if last week is any indication, it's only going to get worse.

"In the '90s, scammers used e-mail," says Michael Argast, a security analyst at Sophos, an antivirus software company. "Today, it's social networking." Argast explains that although people have been trained not to click on suspicious e-mails, they don't operate with the same sense of caution when presented with a link on Facebook or Twitter. Maybe that's why the number of phishing attacks on these kinds of sites — in which people are fishing for account information, as opposed to infecting your computer with a virus — has skyrocketed recently, from 4,600 attacks in 2007 to 11,000 in 2008. This year doesn't look any better, with 6,400 attacks in the first three months of 2009.

Like anything on the Internet, Facebook has never been completely scam-free, but its privacy settings may create a false sense of security: most users can't interact with one another unless they are "friends" or belong to the same general network. The site at first glance would also seem less of a gold mine for swindlers since unlike financial websites, which offer access to victims' bank accounts, there is no direct financial gain from hacking into a Facebook account. But the bad guys know that many of us are lazy or forgetful and use the same password on multiple sites. In early 2008, Facebook noticed a marked increase in the number of scams. "We're the most effective distribution platform on the Internet," says Ryan McGeehan, the company's incidence-response manager. "The level of person-to-person connection doesn't exist anywhere else. And as we get bigger, we become a bigger target."

Facebook monitors users' activity, and when someone goes from a few wall posts a week to hundreds of messages within a few minutes, the security team can logically assume that the account has been hacked. They'll notify the user, reset the password, and the whole issue is usually resolved within a few hours. But when thousands of users are hacked at once — and then their friends are hacked, and their friends' friends are hacked — it can take a few days for Facebook to fix the problem. That's what happened on April 29 and 30, when users found themselves accidentally logging in to a website calledFBAction.net. Designed to look exactly like Facebook, the evil doppelgänger took their info and hacked their accounts.

When MarkMonitor, an outside security company employed by Facebook, shut down the fake website, the scam popped up again on a different site, FBStarter.com. (It too has since been disabled.) "My guess is this was a pretty organized group of people," says Fred Felman, MarkMonitor's chief marketing officer. Felman says the phishers, whoever they were (Internet scammers almost never get caught), were not using the most up-to-date technology, but their creativity and speed makes him think that they have experience and will probably do it again.

A similar phishing scam established a toehold on the website in January. And last year hackers broke into accounts by convincing people to click on links posted on their profile walls. Another common Facebook scam is to hack someone's account and then send messages to friends asking for money (like the old Nigerian businessman scam, but with a hey-it's-your-old-pal twist).

Facebook won't say how many accounts were compromised last week, but a rep notes that the site has never had a scammer hack more than a small fraction of its accounts, adding that the company's security team — which has more than 100 analysts, engineers and programmers — can handle whatever comes their way. "We're going to be attacked again in the future," says McGeehan, "and my role is to be prepared when it happens."

[url]http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1895740,00.html[/URL]

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Cyber-criminals targeting social networks: experts

By Virginie Grognou - July 30, 2009

VALENCIA, Spain (AFP) - - Facebook, MySpace and other social networking sites are inceasingly being targeted by cyber-criminals drawn to the wealth of personal information supplied by users, experts warn.

Data posted on the sites -- name, date of birth, address, job details, email and phone numbers -- is a windfall for hackers, participants at Campus Party, one of the world's biggest gatherings of Internet enthusiasts, said.

A vicious virus Koobface -- "koob" being "book" in reverse -- has affected thousands Facebook and Twitter users since August 2008, said Asier Martinez, a security specialist at global IT solutions provider Panda Security.

"Its spread has been very significant and it has been detected in 4,000 different variants," he told AFP at the week-long event which wraps up Sunday in Valencia in eastern Spain.

The virus hijacks the accounts of social networking site users and sends messages steering friends to hostile sites coontaining malware, a malicious software often designed to infiltrate a computer system for illicit purposes.

In one of its variants, Koobface sends the victim a warning that its Flash player is outdated along with an invitation to download a new version, which is is in fact the virus.

Malware can be used to steal bank account data or credit card information once installed on a personal computer.

Facebook has sought to resist attacks by Koobface and similar viruses by blocking links to hostile sites and shutting down accounts from users that show signs of infection, such as sending too many messages.

"You also must be very careful with people who ask to join your friends list," said Laura Garcia, who writes a popular blog about Internet security, adding that hackers often send requests.

Another danger of social networking sites are the popular quizzes, horoscopes and games made available for free to users which can sometimes be used to hide links to hostile sites, she added.

Birthday greetings and as well as messages sent at Christmas and other holidays may also appear to come from friends when in fact they are linked directly to sites that try to convince would-be victims to reveal personal information like passwords or bank numbers, said Martinez.

The vulnerability of social networking sites was underscored in a study by security company Sophos made public earlier this month.

It found that about half of all companies in the United States block some or all access to them due to concerns about cyber incursions via the sites.
Facebook says that less than one percent of its users have been affected by a security issue, such as a virus, since the site opened in 2004.
Garcia said the number of viruses detected in recent years has exploded while the profile of cyber-criminals has changed.

"Before it was very savvy teenagers who wanted to show off their computer skills. Now you don't really need to know much about information technology to be a hacker, all the tools have already been created," she said.

Real cyber-crime mafias have now taken over, especially in Russia, China Brazil and the Ukraine whose goals are purely economic gain, she said, underscoring that hacking could be highly lucrative.

For an initial investment of $1,500 dollars (1,050 euros) for Mpack, a programme created to infect web pages, hackers can obtain a profit of between $21,000 and $847,000 dollars in just one month, Martinez said.

Around 6,000 people are expected to attend the Campus Party, which unites participants from all over the world to share ideas, experiences and all types of activities related to computers, communications and new technology.

The annual event began in Spain in 1997. Editions of the event have since been held in Brazil and Colombia.

http://www.physorg.com/news168151908.html
 
islamica said:
common response from the blind who refuse to listen to reason or truth.
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Salaam,

I'm being serious. Ban the Internet. Let's assume Facebook is banned. People will develop new social networking sites. The ultimate solution is to ban the Internet.

Besides, Facebook is just a new means of communication. Telephones, mobile phones, email address, Facebook, forums and twitter are a means to communicate to other people. For Facebook, it has additional features like uploading your pictures.

Even on forums, people can take advantage over you.

As long as you keep your personal details to yourself, you are safe...unless you get hacked. :skeleton:
 
When one student is bad in a class, you send him to the office and not cancel the class. When one member here is bad, you ban him and not shut down the forum. FB is here to stay in this digital age and so is the internet. Educating yourself and not using the sites you know are bad news is the key to navigating through this digital age. It doesn't matter if you keep your details to yourself, you will be hacked and if not your details are available to the owners of the site, thus to 3rd parties and intelligence agencies.
 
If FB wasn't so popular, people would not be talking about. FB has been around for many years now, but no fuss was up about it before as it is now. Now that the number of users r increasing, it's the thing to be talking about. I used to have myspace and let me tell you I had more stalkers there, never any on FB but hey no one talks about myspace. Point is...it's not only FB...at least be fair and talk about other social networks as well, if you want to bring awareness to others. Talking about only one does not do the job...that's all.

People can use any avenue to be idiots. Your computer is hackable in general. How many people keep personal files on it? A lot, I assume. Hackers are hackers...they'll want to get into anything and ruin your life lol.
 
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Light of Heaven said:
If FB wasn't so popular, people would not be talking about. FB has been around for many years now, but no fuss was up about it before as it is now. Now that the number of users r increasing, it's the thing to be talking about. I used to have myspace and let me tell you I had more stalkers there, never any on FB but hey no one talks about myspace. Point is...it's not only FB...at least be fair and talk about other social networks as well, if you want to bring awareness to others. Talking about only one does not do the job...that's all.

People can use any avenue to be idiots. Your computer is hackable in general. How many people keep personal files on it? A lot, I assume. Hackers are hackers...they'll want to get into anything and ruin your life lol.
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Either you are not reading the posts or the replies I have to miss the whole point as well as the bigger picture. Other social sites don't engage in what FB does. Your details are available to the owners of the site, thus to 3rd parties and intelligence agencies.

But I guess it doesn't matter for you if your in pak because the sell out government already gave all your details and copy of their database to USA.
 
Details are passed out to third parties apart from FB and they're not even social networks. I used to get spam mails even from myspace. FB is not the only place where info can be leaked out about u, that's my point.
 
Light of Heaven said:
Details are passed out to third parties apart from FB and they're not even social networks. I used to get spam mails even from myspace. FB is not the only place where info can be leaked out about u, that's my point.
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the articles here speak volumes of the deeds of FB. If others want to use it then go ahead, no need to make excuses for themselves.
 
Why do you automatically assume someone is defending FB if they arent speaking directly against it? Lol. Im not gunna lose sleep over not using FB, nor do I condone sitting on FB like an addict. All I'm saying is be fair when you (generally) talk about not using a certain something. There's an endless list of things that do the same thing, social network or not but no one talks about it. I'm not against people advising against FB, I'm just getting sick of multiple threads about FB. FB is getting more air than anything.
 
When other social networks are as dangerous as FB then I'll talk about them as well. You should really start reading the articles posted here to understand the whole evilness of FB over other social sites.



Fraudster used Facebook to hack bank accounts

A hacker stole £35,000 from his neighbours' online bank accounts after working out the answers to their security questions from information they posted on Facebook and Friends Reunited.

14 Aug 2011

Iain Wood spent up to 18 hours per day online, working out passwords from personal information posted on social networking sites by his acquiantances.

He targeted people living in his block of flats in a complex fraud and used his friends' personal details to get past security checks and hack into their bank accounts - stealing more than £35,000 over two years which he blew on gambling.

His scam only came to an end when he became over-confident and changed his system and the authorities were alerted.

Jailing him for 15 months, Judge Guy Whitburn said at Newcastle Crown Court:

"This is the first time I've come across a sophisticated fraud such as this, it was very well planned, complex and clever.

"He was using other people's identities and there was a considerable breach of trust in assuming his neighbours' identities.

"It is an extremely bad deception on people in the same block of flats as he. People's blood runs cold when they see money taken from their accounts."

Wood, 33, was living at Pandon Gate House, on City Road in Newcastle's East End, at the time of the offences, which went on between June 2008 and June last year.

He had got away with his fraud until he dropped his guard and changed his operation by directly transferring money out of one neighbour's account directly into his own, in November 2009.

When the victim was contacted over the withdrawal of £1,500, he realised he had been the victim of a fraud and the police were called.

At that stage the police thought it was a one-off, but when they arrested him Wood blurted out "Have you been on to me for a while?"

A subsequent search of his flat found a variety of bank account pin numbers, someone else's passport, bills and other paperwork, much of which he had taken from the post boxes of other residents in the block.

He admitted hacking into various bank accounts, most of them dormant, and intercepting other people's post when interviewed by police.

Neil Pallister, prosecuting, said: "He said he had figured out how to access online bank accounts.

"He would go on and say he couldn't remember the password and would be asked security questions about date of births and mother's maiden names and he was able to give correct details in some cases.

"He said he would be on the computer 18 hours per day to find out information about people on websites such as Facebook and Friends Reunited.

"He would make friends with people on Facebook and have got their usernames he would try it on the bank websites, on the basis people use the same passwords.

"If that did not work he would fill in the security information which he had got from Facebook and Friends Reunited."

On the occasions he successfully got access to the bank accounts he would change the address details and intercept the cards and take out cash.

Although most of the accounts he targeted were dormant, he was able to exploit the overdraft facility before anyone realised.

Wood, who runs a carpet fitting business, pleaded guilty to seven counts of false representation and asked for a further six similar offences to be taken into account.

He also admitted possessing article for the use in fraud.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/8700762/Fraudster-used-Facebook-to-hack-bank-accounts.html
 
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So because other social networks have "less" evil, we can swipe them under the carpet for now? Why not make mention of it and have people avoid it, before it becomes a pile of dirt too big to clean? The more popular something be omes, the more you will have people talking about it, many of which involves criticism. And because other networks are not popular, no one gives a cookie about it and hence no one will dig up info about it. That's how it always works.

I've read them so many times (off of here) I don't think another read will make a difference. Im not implying I'm head over heels with FB, just don't let it be the only thing people are talking about. One thread should be sufficient to talk about FB. We have more than two. I'm just bothered by the number of threads on this forum only about Facebook, nothing more nothing less.
 
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The TV is more evil than FB...you have no control...you could be watching the news one minute and the next minute you could be watching a toilet paper advert with bums on display

That never happens on FB...but it still has some fitna and it shouldn't be singled out as the only dangerous fitna.
 
Light of Heaven said:
So because other social networks have "less" evil, we can swipe them under the carpet for now? Why not make mention of it and have people avoid it, before it becomes a pile of dirt too big to clean? The more popular something be omes, the more you will have people talking about it, many of which involves criticism. And because other networks are not popular, no one gives a cookie about it and hence no one will dig up info about it. That's how it always works.

I've read them so many times (off of here) I don't think another read will make a difference. Im not implying I'm head over heels with FB, just don't let it be the only thing people are talking about. One thread should be sufficient to talk about FB. We have more than two. I'm just bothered by the number of threads on this forum only about Facebook, nothing more nothing less.
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Everybody and their uncle is on FB. It has such a large member base that it can easily be considered 4th largest country in the world. It has privacy issues and concerns that even the non-Muslims are talking about. It is all over the news making headlines because of it's practices. It and it's features are being banned in European countries, in china and in other nations. It is being used by employers to not hire you and fire you, by adult sites to use the info to lure people to their sites, by matrimonial sites to use the info to lure people to their sites, by corrupt people to set up sex flings (especially in saudi), by pedophile predators to go after kids. And the list goes on and one, when other sites start making headlines and those articles become readily available, i'll post them here. If you or others have concerns about fair coverage then you are more than welcome to open up another thread about other social sites that you think are causing as much fitnah.
 
islamica said:
When one student is bad in a class, you send him to the office and not cancel the class.
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Salaam,

Same with Facebook. You may get cases when intelligence services have been using the website to gather information on certain users. That does not mean you ban the entire thing.

Educating yourself and not using the sites you know are bad news is the key to navigating through this digital age.
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I don't even use Facebook. I think it's a waste of time. But to ban it is pointless because people will make new social networking websites (not sure what you are advocating).

It doesn't matter if you keep your details to yourself, you will be hacked and if not your details are available to the owners of the site, thus to 3rd parties and intelligence agencies.
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Not everyone has been hacked. I'm sure there are other people computers have not been hacked. Besides, the government has information about you. Intelligence services can get their information from the government or track you down.
 
^^FB is a waste of time, but so is generally sitting on the computer lol. Nothing wrong with stating the negatives of something, especially if its serious...just theres no need for multiple threads..about it.

Also I'm not gunna waste time making a thread about one social network in specific...probably if I start a thread, itll be general, detailed advice that covers many things. These FB threads should all be merged together, I think.
 
Tragic Typos said:
Salaam,

Same with Facebook. You may get cases when intelligence services have been using the website to gather information on certain users. That does not mean you ban the entire thing.



I don't even use Facebook. I think it's a waste of time. But to ban it is pointless because people will make new social networking websites (not sure what you are advocating).
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wa'salaams,

i rather people ban it and start a whole new site then continue using it considering all the harms it entails. There is facebook4muslims.com and other such sites. But i'm done with this thread, there's enough info in these articles for those think to know what to make of it.
 
islamica said:
wa'salaams,

i rather people ban it and start a whole new site then continue using it considering all the harms it entails. There is facebook4muslims.com and other such sites. But i'm done with this thread, there's enough info in these articles for those think to know what to make of it.
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:sl:

That new site can be hacked too.
 

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