Don’t Click on That

Facebook is something that just about all of us are on everyday. We get on Facebook to check up on friends (or stalk them), see pictures from vacations that people took, chat, keep up with our favorite radio station, and much more. Facebook kills time and we are addicted to it.

Information can spread on Facebook. Let's say you "Like" KFYO or LFN on your Facebook, everyone will know about it because it shows up in their news feed. If they want, then they can like and the cycle continues. It's the new and digital way of spreading the word. If you respond to this blog while being signed onto Facebook, it will even show up in your news feed if you want.

Just as easy as that happens, malware and spam (bad things for your computer) can spread through Facebook. Here is what today's Wall Street Journal says:

"Malware and spam can spread quickly on Facebook because the site is designed to make it easy to share with friends – sometimes a little too easy. An innocent looking post on a friend’s Wall could encourage you to install a secretly nasty app, setting off a chain reaction for all of your friends."

and...

Unfortunately, sometimes installing a bad app can also give it access to your personal information, which could be stored by the app creator and possibly sold. The personal information could also be used to make more targeted attacks against you at another time, such as a scam email that involves you and your friends’ real names. “This is probably the future,” said Mr. Cosoi, but “so far we have only seen it in proof of concept.”

You've got to be careful with what you click on. I'm very careful and hardly ever click on video's unless I know 100% that it's safe. The WSJ gives some other rules to live by on Facebook:

Like the Seven Deadly Sins, the malware apps are designed to appeal to our worst human tendencies, such as pride, envy, gluttony, greed and lust. Here’s a list of the top five categories of Facebook scam apps, along with their incidence percentage, according to BitDefender.

1) Stalking – 34.7%

2) Free stuff social games (such as Farmville) – 16.2%

3) Shocking curiosities (like porn) – 14.1%

4) Features that Facebook doesn’t offer (like “Who ‘poked’ me the most”) – 12.5%

5) Games not actually offered Facebook (like Super Mario Bros.) – 8.4%