In the last twelve hours I’ve received several identical (and supposedly personal) Facebook messages from legitimate friends urging me to check out an application that will identify who has a crush on me by sending text messages to my phone (I can only imagine the flood of spam and advertisements that this service has in mind).
It was just a matter of time before hackers and spammers directed their efforts at Facebook. One can only hope that Facebook is taking good care of the personal data based on the settings we have selected within their ‘privacy settings’. Would there be any reason to doubt them?
I’ve received the same message. And its coming from users who I would think would be quite responsible about the apps they add to their facebook account. I look forward to finding out the source of this spam.
Comment by Will Spaetzel — April 23, 2008 @ 7:05 am
I got the same message yesterday .. I knew it couldn’t have been from my friend because the subject and the language were all wrong — he doesn’t write like that. Got another a few months ago selling telephone services. So yes, I am sure the spammers are in Facebook.
Comment by Victoria Fenner — April 23, 2008 @ 7:14 am
In an open system like general email, you expect this kind of problem. For a closed system that is trying to sell itself as being concerned about user privacy, this does not bode well.
My specific concern is that it could do a lot of credibility damage to some folks if their account is exploited by spammers to reach their entire ‘friend’ community. You don’t recover from that easily.
Comment by Mark — April 23, 2008 @ 7:19 am
I got the message too, it has to be something in an application. Can’t see any other way, suck that everyone thinks that the guys at Facebook wrote it so tight that it can’t be “hacked” but it was. I hope I didn’t add the application that is sending this spam. I’d like to know which it is!
Comment by Bill Deys — April 23, 2008 @ 7:20 am
And here we were, thinking we had convinced Aunt Mabel not to click on unknown emails on her PC.. but we didn’t tell Mabel about facebook apps. I don’t blame facebook (for once)..
A big chunk of whatever was on a personal PC on 2005 is now on facebook or other web services.. Doesn’t matter if it’s a local file, or a “Hug your favourite wombat” link, people are click-happy, and they will continue to click until they get burned…
Plus ca change….
Comment by Bob Goyetche — April 23, 2008 @ 9:38 am
With all of the coding they have done, with all of the integration and promotion, with all of the money behind it and the predictive behavioural and consumer data they’ve collected, I’m surprised that Facebook hasn’t developed the digital intelligence to prevent and control this type of activity — even if it does stem from user clicks.
Comment by Mark — April 23, 2008 @ 10:53 am
ok, so my facebook has been sending random messages to people but i have never clicked on anything or even gotten a message. so i think my facebook has a virus or something can anyone help me fix it?
Comment by josh — April 23, 2008 @ 2:30 pm
Don’t open it because I did and I ended up having my facebook hacked. A little while after you open it they’ll change you password but they’ll keep your email. DON’T OPEN IT
Comment by karen — August 12, 2008 @ 9:42 pm
My boyfriend got a msg on FB in his inbox a Virus msg and i think he’s opened it on the laptop we share. I got some emails off friends through FB saying whats this you have sent, when i looked i’d not sent them but it shown on the mails that i had? The other day i got more msg’s off friends saying i’d sent them video’s to look at, and yes the spelling was terrible. Next day i tried to log on to FB and it said my password is incorrect? I reset it and i’ve had nothing sent to my email account, looks like they have changed my password and email address. Does anyone know what to do? I have sent FB loads of emails reporting it and heard nothing back, why do they do it?? What do they achieve? Thanks Nicola
Comment by Nicola — October 8, 2008 @ 4:33 pm
I have the same problem I’ve gotten a few mssges from friends saying “why did you send this to me?” when I didn’t send it at all and this morning I found that I had supposedly posted this “home video” how do I stop it?
Comment by Jessica — June 20, 2009 @ 10:14 am
i was hacked a few weeks ago and the email address that was linked to it dosent exist anymore. is there any way to contact someone who works for facebook to get it back? Its not like i can just reset the password anymore.
Comment by amanda — September 2, 2009 @ 8:49 am
ive not been able to log into facebook for 5 days now,i here im not the only one i hear that facebook has been hacked into and someone has messed about with peoples profiles has anyone else herd of this.when i try to log in its saying its not available for site maintainence but for 5 days now?i hope someone can help me plz.
Comment by josette — October 7, 2009 @ 4:36 pm
Have you cleared your browser’s cache? I’ve never heard of a 5-day maintenance window in Facebook.
Comment by Mark — October 13, 2009 @ 6:46 am
I’m having the same problem… can’t log in due to a few more hour maintenance problem. This has been going on for almost a week. When I do finally get logged in, I show 0 in my friends’ list. What’s going on.
Comment by Maggie — October 27, 2009 @ 12:30 pm
Maggie… try clearing your browser’s cache.
Comment by Mark — October 27, 2009 @ 12:40 pm
I've received the same message. And its coming from users who I would think would be quite responsible about the apps they add to their facebook account. I look forward to finding out the source of this spam.
Comment by Will Spaetzel — December 31, 2009 @ 3:04 am
my friends facebook and email has been hacked. how do we fix this
Comment by coreyzeigler — January 22, 2010 @ 7:23 am
I suggest changing all of your passwords then contacting Facebook.
Comment by Mark — January 24, 2010 @ 12:18 pm
mine just did the same thing..execpt mine has random headlines such as “HIHI, I HAVE A SUPRISE FOR YOU, GREATINGS, YEAH, ONLY THE BEST” and it said “Hi.. their name…and a link or a space where a link was removed” im not sure if it sent one to everyone tho
Comment by Allie — February 3, 2010 @ 1:44 am