Social Network Users putting Privacy at Risk

Webroot, the online security software company, after commissioning a new study found that though the users of social-networking websites are adopting measures to safeguard personal privacy ever-since the constant growth in activities across the networking sites. However, they continued to have their sensitive information and personal identities in danger, the company noted.

In its second annual research, Webroot surveyed over 1,100 accountholders of MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other widely accessed social-networking websites.

As per the report, 81% of site members permit anybody from their network browse the activities they last conducted. Moreover, over 25% haven't made changes to the default privacy configurations of their profiles.

Also, the research noted that spam through social-networking sites that typically contained Web-links leading onto malicious sites increased 23% over 2009.

Remarking about this outcome, director of threat research Jeff Horne at Webroot stated that with people crowding on social-networking sites develop an accurate rage, as criminals launch more-and-more advanced malware attacks for harvesting users' personal data, according to the news published by Infosecurity on March 31, 2010.

Horne also outlined that criminals use the Koobface virus to target users of social networks. This malware had over 100 variants all of which aimed at pulling credit card information.

Nevertheless, users in larger numbers are fortunately practicing safe activities like preventing the viewing of their profiles through common search engines. Encouragingly, this type of profile-blocking has increased 37% since 2009.

Infosecurity notes that certain interesting statistics are disclosed in the report. These indicate that members of social networks are exchanging personal details, which could allow malicious attackers to infringe upon their profiles, moneybags, and probably residences.

Here, Horne states that it's important for consumers to improve on self-protection by securing personal profiles as well as by enforcing stronger privacy policies. This is particularly valid when location related software on social media, which reveals the place of a consumer, gets more popular, he explains.

Hence, Webroot recommends that social network users must update their privacy settings to block personal data from external access. They must set passwords separately for separate websites. Additionally, they must install anti-spyware, anti-virus and firewall on their computers.

Related article: SoCal Computer Hack Traces to Watsonville

» SPAMfighter News - 4/9/2010