Posts Tagged Facebook
Andrew Keen on the death of Facebook and the future of the web
by Meghan Keane
Andrew Keen is a former entrepreneur who has since recanted his enthusiasm for Silicon Valley and come out as an outspoken opponent of Web 2.0. Keen is no stranger to controversy. His 2007 book “Cult of the Amateur” argued against the wisdom of crowds and he is known for incendiary commentary, like the time he likened Web 2.0 to a communist society or when he told Stephen Colbert that the Internet is worse than Nazism. In case you were wondering, here’s his definition of blogging: “It’s all about digital narcissism, shameless self-promotion. I find it offensive.”
Keen now writes at The Great Seduction, twitters @ajkeen, and speaks on a variety of topics. This week, Keen wrote that Facebook’s infusion of $200 million from Russian investors signaled “the final act of the Web 2.0 tragi-comedy.” We caught up with him via phone while he was in Alabama this week (“studying the natives”) to discuss the death of Web 2.0 and what comes next.
** Do you think that the formation of this “cult of the amateur” had anything to do with mainstream dissatisfaction with the “experts”?
I think there’s a strong cultural strain of fear and hostility towards experts and professionals. It’s a historic phenomenon, but it’s getting more and more prominent. With the Internet, the little people have the means to challenge the authorities. It’s another kind of rebellion.
Posted by Tom Polanski in Facebook, Interviews, Social Media on June 3rd, 2009
Why phishers love Facebook (and Twitter)
By Bob Sullivan, The Red Tape Chronicles
Facebook is the new playground for phishers. Why? The social networking site has made things relatively easy for computer criminals. So far, the consequences have been relatively mild — mostly, some annoying emails. But if Facebook and other social networking sites don’t get a handle on security issues soon, a serious outbreak could occur.
Behind every successful criminal computer hack a simple two-step process: gain trust, then exploit that trust with an attack. Computer criminals will tell you that gaining trust is the hard part. Consider a real-world parallel: Breaking into a bank is difficult. But if you befriend a guard, he’ll eventually let you walk right in through the front door.
That’s why Facebook attacks are so easy, says Mary Landesman, senior researcher at computer security firm ScanSafe.
“Facebook users assume a level of trust they just should not assume when using the site,” she said.
Posted by Tom Polanski in Facebook, Social Media, Twitter on June 2nd, 2009
The problem with planning social media (no problem)
By Cory Treffiletti
If you were engaged with digital media planning early in the continuum, say from 1995-2000, you regularly heard the phrase, “building the plane while flying it.” That cliché was used commonly to describe the exhilaration and similarly the frustration of media planning in an environment that was un-tested, un-standardized and extremely fluid when compared to its traditional brethren.
The same thing can be said for social media planning right now, because social media is somewhat tested, infinitely un-standardized and extremely fluid. What adds even more difficulty is, it is more about the platform than any of the individual players — which adds a level of complexity that can easily overwhelm an unseasoned planner.
When planning display in digital media, it’s easy to focus on the publisher as the location for placement, and each publisher has a forecasted, finite volume of inventory that can be planned. In social media, publishers are increasingly shifting their focus away from their sites and more to a distributed model that relies on third-party programmer development to create access points.
In a recent article in the Sunday New York Times, Facebook proclaimed its desire for a third party to developers to create new interfaces for accessing the social network rather than driving users to the host .com site. They are not as concerned with site traffic as they are with accessibility to the platform. Twitter is leaps and bounds ahead of the pack when it comes to this concept, with most people accessing Twitter through mobile apps such as Twitterific or desktop apps like TweetDeck.
Posted by Tom Polanski in Facebook, Marketing, Social Media, Twitter on May 22nd, 2009
Facebook phishing attack sought passwords
By Suzanne Choney
A Facebook e-mail phishing scheme was discovered early Thursday among users of the popular social networking site who may have inadvertently clicked on a fraudulent Web link included in a Facebook message to them.
The bogus link took users out of and away from the real Facebook to a fake Facebook site, where they were asked to log in again, giving their passwords, which may have been captured by those behind the scheme.
Facebook said e-mails with the fake link were blocked within the first few hours of being sent out, and that those who may have fallen for the ruse have had their passwords automatically re-set “so that any data the bad guys have becomes useless very quickly,” said company spokesman Barry Schnitt.
Users who did bite on the phishing lure will receive an e-mail from Facebook notifying them that their passwords have been re-set.
One version of the e-mail went like this: “Richard sent you a message. Subject: Hello. “Check 121.im” with “121.im” as a Web link and fake Facebook page.
The phishing scam grew rapidly because accounts that were compromised “immediately sent out hundreds of messages, all with the same content, with the same link,” Schnitt said. He said it is “too early to tell” how many of Facebook’s 200 million users were affected by the scam.
Posted by Tom Polanski in Facebook on May 14th, 2009
West African phishing scam hits my Facebook inbox
By Tom Polanski, EVP, eBrand Media and eBrand Interactive
Over the past few months eBrand Media has consistently sounded an alarm about Facebook, and the cornucopia of information that people share so freely, and unnecessarily, on Facebook. I discovered the e-mail below in my Facebook inbox. It’s far superior to other phishing e-mail in that it’s targeted directly at me, by name, includes the specific name of a supposed relative in the body of the e-mail, and strives to convey a Kings English dialect. It was sent by a “James Desouza” which I’m sure is an alias. Please note the Yahoo! e-mail address. It’s reasonable to expect that attorneys would have a domain name for their law firm, and an e-mail address from that domain.
A search of Facebook delivers 57 results for the name, “James Desouza”. None have pictures.
“Dear Tom Polanski,
I am Barrister James Desouza, a solicitor at law. I am the personal attorney to Eng. J .B.Polanski, a national of your country, who used to work with Shell Development Company in Lome Togo. Here in after shall be referred to as my client. On the 21st of April 2005, my client, his wife and their only daughter were involved in a car accident along Sagbama express road. All occupants of the vehicle unfortunately lost their lives.
Since then I have made several enquiries to your embassy here to locate any of my clients extended relatives, this has also proved unsuccessful. After these several unsuccessful attempts, I decided to track his last name over the Internet, to locate any member of his family hence I contacted you. I have contacted you to assist in recovering the fund valued at US$20.5 Million, left behind by my client before it gets confiscated or declared unserviceable by the Bank where this huge amount were deposited.
Posted by Tom Polanski in Facebook on April 30th, 2009