Web Hosting Reviews & Ratings

December 14, 2010

Social Networking Security Attacks

Recent attacks on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter have left users exposed to malicious intentions. The potential risk of security for these networking sites has made an impact on the seriousness of the situation. Even the President of the United States’ Twitter account was compromised. Being hacked on a social networking site has turned into earning a badge of honor.

On January 5^th, 2009, a Twitter vulnerability was exposed. This hack used microblogging sites internal tools to broadcast tweets from President Obama, Rick Sanchez and Britney Spears. None of these updates were sent out by the real individuals. If this Twitter hack had been the only issue, social networking security would continue to be lax. Other attacks include:

• The fall of Digital Railroad
• The collapse of Twitterank
• Facebook clones
• Viruses in videos

Of these four incidents, the Twitterank fiasco was the most interesting. Thousands of microbloggers were unknowingly prepared to hand over their passwords for little more than a random number. This occurred because personal information was passed to Twitter via an add-on which went through an unregulated third-party site.

Twitter left a major security hole open as a result of this add-on. Twitter never implemented secure technology like OAuth which opened the company to thousands of phishing attempts.

Another area that is vulnerable to hackers is password sharing. In Facebook, when asked to Find Friends and Invite Your Friends, you enter your email addresses and passwords for online email accounts like Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo. Any hacker can intercept this request and have access to your mail accounts which can lead to worse situations.

This type of password sharing also lends to a casual attitude of individuals being forced to supply a password to a third-party site. This is becoming such a common practice, a term has been coined to describe it; password antipattern which is a design feature that initially appears to be beneficial but ends in more negative than positive results.

The breach of Twitterank has produced a positive result in regards to Twitter security. Twitter implemented OAuth and immediately created a closed beta program featuring the solution. Also, other social networks evaluated their internal security measures and procedures.

With the vast number of users on social networks, it is important to protect their information and more importantly, their identity. By taking all proper measures and ensuring no security holes exists, members will feel more at ease.

Tags: social networking,  security,  Facebook,  Twitter,  security risk,  hacker,  hacked,  Twitterank