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Facebook to Change European Service After Data-Privacy Probe – Businessweek

December 21, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Facebook Inc., the world’s biggest social networking site, will overhaul its service in Europe over the next six months as a result of an investigation into how the social network handles personal data.

Facebook “has agreed to a wide range of best practice improvements” to its service that will get a formal review in July, the Irish data-protection agency said today, after concluding a three-month audit. Facebook’s Ireland operation is responsible for all the Palo Alto, California-based company’s users outside the U.S. and Canada, the agency said.

“This was a challenging engagement both for my office and for Facebook Ireland,” Billy Hawkes, Ireland’s data-protection commissioner, said in an e-mail. The report said there has to be “increased transparency and controls for the use of personal data for advertising purposes” and “the deletion of data held from user interactions with the site much sooner.”

via Facebook to Change European Service After Data-Privacy Probe – Businessweek.

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Porn Spammers Tracked, Identified Claims Facebook | ITProPortal.com

November 17, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Facebook is claiming that it has succeeded in identifying the source responsible for the recent flooding of hardcore porn as well as violent images posted in some users’ newsfeeds in this popular social networking site. Facebook Inc. commented that their legal team will “ensure appropriate consequences follow”.

via Porn Spammers Tracked, Identified Claims Facebook | ITProPortal.com.

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DHS to set up policies for monitoring Twitter, Facebook – Computerworld

November 2, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Computerworld – When the U.S. Department of Homeland Security receives information about potential threats to the U.S., agents may turn to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Caryn Wagner, undersecretary of the DHS, told an audience Monday at the National Symposium on Homeland Security and Defense in Colorado Springs that the agency began to draw up guidelines for monitoring social networking sites after the sites were heavily used during government uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa this year.

According to an Associated Press report Tuesday, federal agents are still mulling over how to best pull intelligence from social media sites and determine whether it is valid or Web chatter.

“We’re still trying to figure out how you use things like Twitter as a source,” said Wagner, according to the AP report. “How do you establish trends and how do you then capture that in an intelligence product?”

The DHS, whose mission is to protect the country from terrorist attacks, isn’t actively monitoring Facebook or Twitter. However, when the agency receives a tip about a potential threat, agents will scour public sites for information.

via DHS to set up policies for monitoring Twitter, Facebook – Computerworld.

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Facebook says 600,000 account logins compromised every day | msnbc.com

October 29, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Facebook said this week that hackers using stolen username and password credentials try to break into at least 600,000 accounts every day on the mammoth social networking site.

The revelation was buried in a new security announcement issued by the company on Thursday describing the virtues of its new “Trusted Friends” password restoration technique. UK-based computer security firm Sophos first noticed the data.

The Facebook blog entry includes an infographic explaining the success of the network’s efforts to beat back spam, account hijacking, and other ills.  In it, Facebook says that “only 0.06 percent of 1 billion logins per day are compromised.” The site is able to precisely count the number of stolen or otherwise compromised logins because it challenges the would-be hackers with additional authentication questions, such as asking users to identify friends in pictures, said spokesman Barry Schnitt.

“(This means) 600,000 times a day, we stop a bad guy from getting access to an account even though he has guessed, phished, or stolen the login and password of an account,” Schnitt said. “This is something we’re very proud of.”

via Red Tape – Facebook says 600,000 account logins compromised every day.

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Facebook could face €100,000 fine for holding data that users have deleted | The Guardian

October 22, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Facebook could face a fine of up to €100,000 (£87,000) after an Austrian law student discovered the social networking site held 1,200 pages of personal data about him, much of which he had deleted.

Max Schrems, 24, decided to ask Facebook for a copy of his data in June after attending a lecture by a Facebook executive while on an exchange programme at Santa Clara University in California.

Schrems was shocked when he eventually received a CD from California containing messages and information he says he had deleted from his profile in the three years since he joined the site.

After receiving the data, Schrems decided to log a list of 22 separate complaints with the Irish data protection commissioner, which next week is to carry out its first audit of Facebook. He wrote to Ireland after discovering that European users are administered by the Irish Facebook subsidiary. A spokeswoman for the commissioner confirmed its officers would be investigating alleged breaches raised by Schrems as part of the audit. If the commissioner decides to prosecute and Facebook or any employees are found guilty of data protection breaches, the maximum penalty is a fine of €100,000.

Among the 1,200 pages of data Schrems was sent were rejected friend requests, incidences where he “defriended” someone, as well as a log of all Facebook chats he had ever had. There was also a list of photos he had detagged of himself, the names of everyone he had ever “poked”, which events he had attended, which he hadn’t replied to, and much more besides.

The information was broken down into 57 categories, including likes, log-ons (a list of when he logged on and which IP address he used) and emails, which included some email addresses Schrems had never personally uploaded to the site but which he assumes were discerned from another user’s profile.

via Facebook could face €100,000 fine for holding data that users have deleted | Technology | The Guardian.

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How Social Media Affects E-Discovery | Business 2 Community

September 21, 2011 By Leave a Comment

If you’re not exactly sure what e-discovery is, simply tune in to one of the many CSI shows currently airing; they’re bound to feature the latest form of forensic science, which uses electronic data gathered from computers, cell phones, and other devices as evidence for courtroom trials.  In many cases, the process of electronic discovery is carried out by software that searches through the multitude of data to find keywords that could be of use during an investigation and trial.  This process is both time and cost effective, which is why it has become so popular.  But what is the role that social networking plays in the process of e-discovery?  Can it help during a trial, or will it only hinder forward progress?  Here’s the 411 on how social networking coincides with e-discovery.

In most cases, social networking provides a gold mine for any lawyer wishing to dig up dirt, so to speak.  Nearly everyone seems to be involved in some type of social networking these days, whether they have a page on MySpace or Facebook or a Twitter feed that they post to daily.  In addition to offering a public forum for discussions on issues personal, political, and other, social networking sites also tend to foster an atmosphere that is uninhibited.  Surprisingly, people will post all kinds of information that can be used in a trial setting as evidence.  So in this way, social networking can be a major boon in the e-discovery arena.

Of course, not every instance of e-discovery is linked to litigation.  In fact, many corporations are beginning to utilize e-discovery tactics to keep tabs on what their employees are doing online.  For example, businesses may use software that monitors the Facebook pages and Twitter feeds of employees in order to catch them making derogatory statements about the company they work for, or even disseminating information that is considered to be company property (in other words, leaking corporate secrets).  Because people often feel the no one is looking, they may say things that the company would rather they didn’t.  But someone is always watching.

via How Social Media Affects E-Discovery | Business 2 Community.

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Facebook Pays $40G To Hackers In New ‘Bug Bounty’ Scheme | FoxNews.com

August 31, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Since launching its “bug bounty” program three weeks ago, Facebook has forked out $40,000 to hackers who detected security flaws on the social networking site.

About fifty people who have successfully identified problems have been acknowledged on Facebook’s “whitehat” — geek-speak for a hacker who is a good guy — site, and to date, Facebook has paid one individual $7,000 for flagging six issues and $5,000 for a particularly bad flaw, the Financial Times reported Wednesday.

“We realize … that there are many talented and well-intentioned security experts around the world who don’t work for Facebook,” Facebook’s chief security officer, Joe Sullivan, wrote on the company’s blog Monday.

“We established this bug bounty program in an effort to recognize and reward these individuals for their good work and encourage others to join,” he added.

Facebook said that while it had received time-wasting alerts from people “looking for publicity,” the program was a success.

via Facebook Pays $40G To Hackers In New ‘Bug Bounty’ Scheme | FoxNews.com.

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Half of America Is Using Social Networks – NYTimes.com

August 30, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Social networks have crossed another milestone.

For the first time, half of all adults in the United States said they used a social networking site, according to a survey released on Friday by the Pew Research Center.

That is 50 percent of all Americans, not just those who say they are online. Six years ago, when Pew first conducted a similar survey, only 5 percent of all adults said they used social sites, like Facebook, LinkedIn or MySpace.

It is a sign of how deeply and widely social networking companies have penetrated the lives of ordinary people and, in turn, transformed the ways in which people communicate, authorities govern and companies sell things.

Parents use Facebook to vet nannies, carmakers to introduce new models, police to keep tabs on suspects. Federal government authorities are preparing this weekend to use social networking sites for hurricane preparation on the East Coast.

The Pew survey found that among adults who are online, the rates of participation were higher: 65 percent, according to the survey, up slightly from 61 percent last year.

Not surprising, the sites are more popular among younger people: 83 percent of people surveyed in the 18-29 age bracket said they used social networking sites, compared with 51 percent of those in the 50-64 bracket. The young are also twice as likely to use social sites every day.

via Half of America Is Using Social Networks – NYTimes.com.

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Ten Best Practices to Prevent Data and Privacy Breaches | PCWorld Business Center

July 29, 2011 By 1 Comment

The antics of groups like Anonymous and LulzSec over the past few months have made data breaches seem inevitable. If information security vendors like HBGary and RSA Security aren’t safe, what hope does an average SMB have? It is true that there is no silver bullet, and no impervious network security, but there are a variety of things IT admins can do to prevent network breaches and protect data and privacy better.

The Web safety and online identity protection experts at SafetyWeb.com and myID.com helped put together a list of ten different data and privacy breach scenarios, along with suggestions and best practices to avoid them.

1. Data Breach Resulting From Poor Networking Choices. Names like Cisco and Sun are synonymous with enterprise-level networking technologies used in large IT departments around the world. Small or medium businesses, however, generally lack the budget necessary for equipment like that. If an SMB has a network infrastructures at all, it may be built around networking hardware designed for consumer use. Some may forego the use of routers at all, plugging directly into the Internet. Business owners can improve network security and block most threats by using a quality router, like a Netgear or Buffalo brand router and making sure to change the router password from the default.

Taking some simple precautions can thwart most attacks.

2. Data Breach Resulting From Improper Shredding Practices. Dumpster diving identity thieves target businesses that throw out paperwork without shredding it. Most home shredders will suffice for small businesses in a pinch, but a commercial shredder is a wise investment if private information is printed and shredded daily. Make sure that documents with sensitive information or personally identifiable data are thoroughly shredded before disposal.

3. Tax Records Theft Around Tax Time. On a similar note, businesses need to pay extra attention to incoming and outgoing information related to taxes. Businesses must ensure that tax returns are dropped off at the post office and refunds are collected promptly from the mailbox. Identity thieves often steal tax returns from an outbox or mailbox.

continued @ Ten Best Practices to Prevent Data and Privacy Breaches | PCWorld Business Center.

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Is Microsoft launching a social network? – Computerworld

July 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The social networking world may be getting even more interesting.

Microsoft may have accidentally leaked an image of its own social networking platform. Called “Tulalip,” the site is designed to enable users to “find what you need and share what you know easier than ever,” according to the image of its home page.

Judging from the one page, users would be able to sign in to the site using their Facebook or Twitter accounts.

According to the Fusible.com website, the image was discovered at the Microsoft-owned domain socl.com. The site, Fusible reported, was not operational when it was found this week.

As of Friday morning, the page had been removed from the site and replaced with this message: “Thanks for stopping by. Socl.com is an internal design project from a team in Microsoft Research which was mistakenly published to the web. We didn’t mean to, honest.”

via Is Microsoft launching a social network? – Computerworld.

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