This weekend I received an email from a Facebook friend suggesting I take a look at a video by clicking the embedded link. Given my background in security, I naturally didn't click on it but I completely understand why someone would. After all, these kinds of emails are exchanged between friends all day long on Facebook.
It's a good thing that I decided to pass on the video - it turns out that this "friendly video" email was actually a variation of the Koobface virus as reported earlier this year on the Trend Micro blog. This is not a new virus but it's finding renewed vitality on Facebook and other social networking sites.
Given their popularity, it's no surprise that social media/social networking platforms are facing increasing security threats. Earlier this year, this article on Time highlighted the increase of phishing attacks (not viruses) - 4,600 in 2007, 11,000 in 2008, 6,400 in the first quarter of 2009.
By the way, this isn't just a Facebook problem. Twitter users face increasing spam, phishing and virus/worms such as the Stalk Daily virus that reared its ugly head in April. Previous authentication issues in Twitter, resulted in vulnerabilities discussed in this article by Brian Krebs.
Being the grand-daddy of the social media sites, over the years MySpace has faced numerous security challenges as well.
Let's be careful out there, people - security threats on social media platforms are on the rise.
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