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Social Networker, Meet Identity Thief
David Utter
Staff Writer
2006-10-05
 Insider Reports RSS Feed
The National Cyber Security Alliance and technology firm CA announced results of their study into social networking behavior and how it could expose people to criminals.
Eighty-three percent of adults who engage in social networking through websites like Facebook and MySpace engage in activities that leave them vulnerable to attacks. That is the percentage of people who download files from profiles of other people, without knowing what those files really contain.
Details of the study conducted by CA and the National Cyber Security Alliance revealed several other statistics about people and their online actions:
• Although 57 percent of people who use social networking sites admit to worrying about becoming a victim of cyber-crime, they are still divulging information that may put them at risk. For example 74 percent have given out some sort of personal information, such as their e-mail address, name and birthday.
• 51 percent of parents aware of their children social networking do not restrict their children's profiles so only friends can view, leaving their child's profiles unrestricted to potential predators.
• Furthermore, 36 percent of these parents surveyed do not monitor their children on social networking sites at all.
"Although the general community thinks most social networking users are teens, the CA/NCSA survey showed the popularity of these sites is extending beyond young early adopters to other segments of the population," said Ron Texeria, executive director of NCSA. "Those who frequent these sites should be aware the data they share may make them prey for online attacks."
When people practice risky behavior on social networking sites while at work, they run the risk of harming the company. Should someone download a malicious file containing a worm, an entire network could be infected if it is a zero-day exploit that has yet to be patched.
If that worm contains a keylogger, as quite a few do, login details for sites inside and outside the network would be captured and forwarded to those who created the worm. Should that login lead to a financial site, information there could reveal enough personally identifiable details to facilitate identity theft.
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Tags: Social Networking, Identity Theft
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About the Author:
David Utter is a business and technology writer for SecurityProNews and WebProNews.
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