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Can your Facebook account get hacked?
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Ever wonder if it is really possible to get your Facebook account hacked?
Sorry to say, getting your Facebook, or any other social media account, hacked can and does happen. For individual low profile folks out there, access is typically gained through poor password selection or installation of rogue applications and unknown friends. Low profile meaning NOT Sara Palin or Barrack Obama.
When it comes to generating passwords, despite knowing better, most Americans are just not that creative when it comes to creating a password. This is the lament issued by a collection of high school teachers on their blog, "Teaching High School Psychology." They go on to list some of the most common reasons that hackers are able to guess passwords for general user accounts.
- 16% used their own first name or that of one of their children
- 14% used simple keyboard combinations such as "123456789" or "QWERTY"
- 5% of the passwords were of television shows, famous names, etc. such as "Hannah," "Matrix," or "Ironman"
- 4% used the word "password" or a close variation "password1"
- 3% used phases such as "Idontcare," "Whatever," "Yes," or "No.
What's more, I bet quite a few folks reading this have a password or two residing on a dubious list entitled, "The Top 500 Worst Passwords of All Time". If you see your password here, go straight to jail and do not pass go. But before you do that, change your dang password to something not on the list. Keep in mind that any information in the public domain can and will be used against you by hackers. ANY piece of information (Read: Google yourself and see what information is out there about you, you might be surprised).
This means your dog's name, your children's name, your birthdate, your home state, your zip, your street address, your alma mater, everything is out there for the taking. A hacker can assemble all of these items into a list and begin running through the combinations to generate probable passwords. That's not good news.
Want to know how to choose a better password? Grab a small cup of joe and peruse the following link; Click here to peruse. Yeah it's boring and completely non-sexy, but at least you won't have to send an email to everyone apologizing for the hee-bee-gee-bees you gave their pc (sorry, sorry. Or Mac). And remember to change your password at least 3 times a year.
Another predominate way to get hacked on Facebook in particular and other social sites in general is to continually install and allow random applications to access your information. Keep in mind, these applications ARE NOT, in general, built by Facebook and its development group. These are private groups and organizations with wild ideas and dreams of grandeur that assemble the applications. Some have good intentions and others, not so much. There is no verification process for developers putting together Facebook applications so installer beware.
On Facebook in particular, the applications will rifle through your user list sending random join messages to your unsuspecting friends. And bam, before you know it, cyber calamity. It's ok to decline to allow applications access to your information. If they really need it, they'll IM you.
Akin to installing random applications is the Facebook XSS hack. This results from adding someone as a friend who in fact is a hacker with malicious code embedded in their profile.
This hack works when someone creates a fake profile which has stored in it executable CSS code. When an unwitting user adds the hackers profile, the hacker can, through use of I-frames, write to the that unwitting users wall, or worse yet, install applications. Once the applications are installed other bad things can begin happening.
Enough talk, go change your passwords and practice saying, "No, you can not have access to my information" and I will not add those I don't know.
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