Facebook crimes grow increasingly sophisticated

FACEBOOK crimes, from scams to online bullying, are on the rise and they are getting more sophisticated, experts warn.

It’s no secret that scammers on the social media website rely on carefully crafted baits that often include scandalous and explicit video content or footage of the latest events, from celebrity death claims to never-before-seen footage of a natural disaster.

Just last week a “clickjacking” scam that claimed Lady Gaga was found dead in a hotel room spread like wildfire on Facebook, thanks to a link to a fake BBC News website.

Ploys such as the Lady Gaga scam aim to increase clicks to a page because they are paid by advertisers for every click they generate. Others steal personal information, which is extracted when users fill out a fake survey, and that data is sold to other cybercriminals.

Rarer cybercrimes on Facebook involve the installation of malicious software, or “malware,” on computers so credit card information can be easily stolen.

However, the rise of these Facebook crimes isn’t limited to just scams and phishing activities. There’s also cyberbullying, sexual predation and even robberies that occur after users post GPS location about their whereabouts to inform others they are out of town.

As Facebook becomes riskier to use, experts are weighing in on why these crimes are happening at such a rapid rate.

“These types of crimes are designed to use your own actions or weaknesses against you,” said Lynette Owens, director of Internet Safety for Kids & Families, an online resource hosted by Trend Micro, a digital security firm based in Tokyo.

“As humans, and for good reason, we put trust in others more often than not because most people at most times are worthy of that trust. The online world is no different than the offline world in that sense.”

A recent Pew Internet & American Life study found that Facebook users are more trusting than people who are not members of the social networking site.

In fact, a Facebook user who uses the site multiple times per day is 43% more likely than other Internet users, and more than three times as likely as non-Internet users, to feel that most people can be trusted.

According to Paul Zak, a professor at Claremont College, scammers prey on Facebook users not only because they are an easy target, but because they also don’t know their victims.

“It’s easier to hurt someone when you’re not seeing them in person,” Zak said. “Neuroscience research shows that moral violations are less likely when interactions are personal because people empathise with those they meet in person. In the online world, people are just a number.”

Many scams include pictures since the brain is especially sensitive to images, Zak said.

For example, he noted that a reoccurring scam started popping up on Facebook that solicited donations to pay for the funeral of a young child allegedly from a neighbouring town.

“However, we started to notice that every weekend there was another child’s funeral that needed donations, and that’s when suspicions started to rise,” Zak said.

“Social engineering has reached unprecedented levels, with scam waves being customised according to the very latest events that make the headlines of tabloids,” Ioana Jelea, communication specialist at BitDefender, said.

“With celebrity-themed baits, for example, click counts will spike within hours, and as hot topics become ‘old news,’ they will be dropped and rapidly replaced with fresh meat.”

Cyberbullying, sexual predator behaviour and other non-spam related social networking crimes have been in the spotlight over the last year, especially as some events have led to tragic consequences.

In Autumn 2010, a student from Rutgers committed suicide after his roommate posted a video of him engaging in a sexual act and posted a message about it on Twitter. In addition, news of sexual predators lurking behind Facebook personas and establishing relationships with children has also created a media stir.

“Most sex offenders are under some type of electronic surveillance, which prevents them from being in the vicinity of children, but Facebook allows them to create dummy profiles to nurture relationships with minors,” said Sedgrid Lewis, founder of Atlanta-based Spy Parent LLC. “After sexual predators gain the trust of the minor, then they invite them to a location to meet.”

BitDefender’s Jelea argues that it’s not just users’ trust in the platform that puts them at risk, it’s their insufficient familiarity with the Facebook’s privacy settings, as well as the threats of online info sharing.

“Simple yet often disregarded precautions, such as carefully reading the permissions requested by an app, could spare users the effort of cleaning their accounts of automatic scammy posts,” Jelea said.