Wednesday, 3 October 2007

Facebook Raises Privacy Concerns

Popular social networking site Facebook has been urged to improve its default privacy settings following new research that revealed members are unwittingly exposing their personal details on a mass scale to millions of strangers, putting themselves at risk of identity theft.

According to IT and security control firm Sophos which took a random snapshot of 200 users in the London Facebook network-- the single largest geographic network on the site with more than 1.2 million members--found that a staggering 75 per cent allow their profiles to be viewed by any other member regardless of whether they agreed to be friends.

Worryingly for businesses, 25 per cent of London members reveal information relating to their work - details that could potentially be used by cybercriminals in their attempts to commit corporate ID fraud or to infiltrate company networks.

Facebook is made up of thousands of networks worldwide, and users are encouraged to join them in order to meet and make friends with people in their area. Even if you have previously set up your privacy settings to ensure that only friends can view your information, joining a network automatically opens your profile to every other member of the network.

Sophos experts note that this is a worrying situation, particularly given the growing popularity of these networks. For instance, in May 2007, there were just 375,000 Facebook members in the London network, a three-fold increase in just four months means that an unprecedented amount of personal and corporate information is now available for strangers to view.

"While Facebook's privacy features are far more sophisticated than competing social networking sites, too many members still aren't getting the message about how to use them effectively to help protect against ID theft. Facebook has ultimately put these privacy options in place to protect its flock so perhaps it's time for the networking phenomenon to take the next step and change its default settings so that when members join a network, they have to actively click to leave their details on show, rather than automatically letting it all hang out online," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos.

The research further highlighted that 54 per cent of users in the London network show their full date of birth; vital information for cybercriminals wishing to commit identity fraud.

One per cent, which is an estimated 12,000 people, are divulging their phone number to over a million strangers. While smaller networks may not pose as great a threat as the massive London circle, each one - whether regional, work or college related - presents a significant risk to members that fail to check and amend their privacy settings.