On a daily basis, I hear someone say Facebook is not secure, Facebook was hacked and sent a message to all my friends, Facebook this, and Facebook that. For the most part these people are all wrong and they got hacked because of something they did wrong. Not Facebook.
All this being said I am not saying Facebook is perfect. Facebook has issues :
1. Changing privacy settings to something different that the user set them as.
2. Approving applications that are dirty.
Examples of Facebook People getting “hacked”
Dirty Application – Just the other day Mashable had a story on a new Facebook scam that when activated, would send comment spam. That same day, the amount of people that complained about their Facebook account or Facebook in general getting hacked soared. Now what really happened ?
- Did Facebook get hacked?
- Did the individual user get hacked?
- Did the account owner approve a dirty application?
Dirty Application – Someone posted the below comment to my wall via Friends Photos.
I asked her what it was. She said she got hacked and said sorry. I attempted to add Friends Photos to my profile. While doing so this pop up came.
It clearly says it will access all my information. Do you honestly think this application is just going to sit on the information or do something with it? The warning screen above does not say the application will log in to my account to post messages though so I allowed the application and shorty after received an email telling me this application just logged in to my account. This sent a red flag and I removed it. This persons Faceook was not hacked. She just authorized an application to do whatever it pleases.
Example of Individual Facebook accounts getting hacked.
User Error – Every day I hear someone say my facebook was hacked again and Facebook should secure their site. When I hear this I want to fall on the floor laughing because an individual account getting hacked does not make facebook insecure. More often than not it confirms you are not secure.
- If your profile is public, hackers can see your email. They can assume that email is also your login email and with trial and error they can guess your password. There are 500 million facebook users, eventually someone will get an email password combo that works.
- If this happens, your account was hacked because of you NOT Facebook, your account was public, your email was public and you had a basic password like password or abc123.
If you want to stop getting “hacked” – do the following.
- Stop liking every Facebook Application you see.
- You need to delete the Apps you no longer use. (Account > privacy > Apps & settings > edit your settings)
- You need to browse Faceook with the new secure setting. ( Accounts > account settings > account security)
- Change your password to something other than a common word, name, or your birthday. Use both letters, numbers, lower and upper case.
- Check your account and privacy settings weekly.
Facebook is no different than any other company when it comes to receiving feedback from their customers.
- People generally leave negative feedback over good.
- I am sure you are are included in this statistic.
- Do you remember the last company to really upset you?
- What about the last one that couldn’t have done anything better?
- Now think of your last contact with each, which company do you remember more about?
I don’t know about you but, I get an email every time someone logs in to my account. If the attempt came from a location I did not approve. Facebook will also disable my account until I answer a series of questions to confirm I am really me. This seems pretty secure to me. Don’t you think?
Now think back to when you thought you got hacked, what happened? Do you think you had anything to do with it?
- Was your login email the same as the email in your info section?
- Was your password your name, your children’s name, wifes name, birth date?
- If so, was your name, your children’s name, wifes name, birth date also public information?
- Did you install a new application shortly before?
If you had nothing to do with share your experience below and prove me wrong.
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