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I logged into my MySpace account and discovered an AMBER Alert located at the top, center of the dashboard. While it appears they deployed this system earlier this year, I’m glad to see it in action. I’m also pleased to see safety leveraging social media, instead of criticizing it. More »
Social Networking is almost cliche these days because it’s often overused, duplicated and imitated several times over. However, in light of a few recent acquisitions, I intend to find out how does one define the value of a growing social network? More »
Tags: aol, business, Google, money, myspace, social mediaIt’s probably a good time that I share my thoughts on the tireless debate surrounding online community moderation of user contributed content — what works, what doesn’t and what the future holds for moderation of the Web. More »
Tags: , aol, community, consumer advocacy, myspace, Safety, Social Networking, web, YahooWhat annoys you more on social networks? Spam friend requests, spammy comments or other junk? Well, that’s nothing compared to malicious Windows exploits being used to dupe MySpace users now. However, this raises interest into the larger problem at hand: Users are still naive/vulnerable to phishing, ten years after it’s peak.
A lot of social networks provided have absolved the password cracking problem (for now) with CAPTCHAs. (CAPTCHAs are images that are distorted to prevent bots from brute forcing their way into accounts.) However, there are several other ways that innocent Web users are being compromised — and don’t even know it! I’m fairly certain that social networks have taken the necessary steps protecting their facility, the user data and educating their employees, but who’s left? Users.
Users are constantly being phished for their accounts. The social connections (and trust) that users on social networks offers a very high value for professional phishers. Phishing relies on trust, and thus compromising one account enables half the work to be done. There’s very little that networks have done to inform users, from my analysis. Networks haven’t done enough to educate users on the behavior or the actual functions of their Web site, they cite to simply not give their password out. This results in a lot of account being compromised, spreading more malicious content, thereby threatening the network even more.
(Well, duh, no one just gives their password out, silly.) The problem is a lot of the phishing URLs used to prey on users are aimed in looking at their photo albums or some wild video. Everyone loves to look at pictures or video, it’s what we do online. When the victim clicks the link they are prompted with a fictitious login window to see it. Bam! The account is compromised, and guess who will be posting the spam link next?
It’s exploitation of word of mouth marketing (viral) and abuses the trust that people forged on these social networks. That is, if someone trusts their best friend, they will automatically open the link without questioning its cause or basis. Understand my spirit in this: Users aren’t stupid, they are human. Human problems require human solutions to address them.
Honestly, the best thing a social network can do, is educate users — from day one — on proper account security practices. That is, inform them on various ways to check the legitimacy of messages, educate users to receive security updates from their OS, recommend secure Browsers like [gasp!] IE7 or Firefox, and be their advocate in addressing spam and viruses. Don’t wait until you shut their account down to educate them because their primary objective is to get back online to chat with friends, not heed security warnings.
What makes this the largest threat to social networks? Phishing threatens users, data integrity, and users’ trust of social networks. There is very little networks can do to address the problem other than blacklisting IP addresses (which can be obfuscated with proxies), blacklisting URLs that gain popularity quickly (moderate URLs being posted), and simply educating users. There are many drawbacks to any step they take, mainly resulting in false-positives.
Do you run a social network? What steps are you taking to secure it from phishers?
Also check out Help: What to Do if Your MySpace Account is Phished at DygiScape and MySpace: Your Account Has Been Phished!
Tags: myspace, News, Security, Social NetworkingIf your MySpace account was hacked or phished, there are a few easy steps you can take to recover it and prevent further compromises from happening again. My earlier entry documented the account lockout process and has since been a very sustainable source of traffic, so I suspect a lot of users are having their MySpace accounts compromised. I intend to answer general questions on this, but understand that I do not work for MySpace nor do I have any affiliation to them.
How did someone hack my MySpace account?
Two ways: you gave them your password unknowingly or they cracked your password. A lot of the hackers (I use the term loosely here) craft seemingly creative scams to lure unsuspecting users into divulging their login information to them. The likely scenario is they posted a link, you clicked it and had to “login” again with a look-a-like Web page. If they cracked it, it means you had a simple password and they guessed it, usually by means of running through the English dictionary against your login. Continue reading to learn the steps you need to take to prevent further account compromises.
Why Me?
Phishers don’t particularly care who they compromise. They just want an account to blast their spam and scams. Most of it is done via automated processes (”bots”), so don’t take it personal if someone hacked your account. Continue reading to learn the steps you need to take to prevent further account compromises.
Why did MySpace lock me out?
MySpace has detection mechanisms for unauthorized activity — like aggregating the posted hyperlinks into their database to identify spam or other potentially malicious Web sites. When an account posts a “blacklisted” hyperlink, likely the account gets locked out for phishing. Your account has been locked to prevent further abuse. Continue reading to learn the steps you need to take to prevent further account compromises.
How do I get back into my MySpace account?
MySpace has a considerably straightforward process. When you login with your [old] password, it forces you to clear a CAPTCHA and create a new password. However, if your computer has a virus or a trojan, you will likely have trouble accessing your account. Continue reading to learn the steps you need to take to prevent further account compromises.
WHAT TO IF YOUR MYSPACE ACCOUNT IS PHISHED/HACKED:
That’s really all there is to preventing your account being hacked. While there are other possibilities, this will cover the most common ways phishers can hack your MySpace and send spam. Thanks to all of you with your comments on my earlier entry about the error message, Your Account Has Been Phished!, you can read more about the problem (and my thoughts on it) there.
If you have any other questions on keeping your account secure, feel free to ask them in the comments below.
~Joe
Tags: Help, myspace, Security, spamMySpace’s Tom Anderson has been discovered as misrepresenting his age. Newsweek obtained [link via KCHBlog] documents that reveal Tom’s birth date — making him 37 — not 33. MySpace officially states that misrepresenting age will result in account deletion:
[...] We take extra precautions to protect our younger members and we are not able to do so if they do not identify themselves as such. MySpace will delete users whom we find to be younger than 14, or those misrepresenting their age. [...]
I guess when MySpace was on its way to being popular, Tom Anderson wanted to be cool, and be in his mid twenties and not thirties.
I might sound like an ass, but if the #1 user/public relations person can misrepresent their age, even by four years, why should the rest of the users be held accountable for it? What good is the age if even the company’s own representative fails to comply with this basic guideline? I understand that he isn’t the only one, and I feel for him because he’s on the hook in this way — but the company hasn’t spun any damage control yet, nor any response from Tom.
I imagine that someone might reply with “But Tom is an adult and didn’t hurt anyone,” but my response to that is two parts:
* Yes, he’s an adult +/- four years. His actions should reflect what’s within MySpace’s guidelines, and set the example for others. If he was 20, is it appropriate for him to represent that he’s 16? Where do we draw the line in this — we can’t because in America age is important because it authorizes you to purchase alcohol, tobacco, adult magazines, firearms, and the age of sexual consent.
* He didn’t hurt anyone, except for all the users who were deleted for providing false age.
What do I expect to be the outcome of all of this? Well, it would be laughable to see Tom’s profile get deleted … but I know that’s very unlikely. It would be more reasonable for Tom to correct his age information and do a blog entry about why his age differed and what the guideline is for users. I’m not the only one who feels this way, TechCrunch broke this on Oct 23rd and there still hasn’t been any change to his profile’s age!
If you’re interested, my age on social networking sites (work related or not), I don’t lie about my age. I don’t disclose my birthday for security reasons, but on all of them, I am listed as being born in 1985, making me 22.
Should Tom change his age or is it OK for someone to misrepresent their age on these social networking Web sites? Let me know what you think in the comments.
Tags: age, age verification, myspace, Safety, Social Networking, tom andersonLately, Facebook has been quickly catching up to MySpace for world domination, or at least Techmeme news aggregator domination. But the question critics always ask, “is it sustainable,” at least when it comes to reaching new audiences and keeping the perceived value in a product high.
I try not to rely on numbers for a lot of my logic, I use fuzzy logic and qualitative analysis, but I figure I’ll take a deep dive and see what I find.
Buzz
Facebook has generated a lot of buzz, not from themselves, rather among many A-list bloggers. Most notably, Microsoft’s rumor to buy Facebook for $6 Billion. I decided to run some quick Google searches on various terms in the industry on the Techmeme aggregator to compare where FB is to MySpace to the Industry. Here is what I found:
MySpace leads as #1 as Facebook follows closely at #2 number of stories on TM.
“Real World” Metrics
Popularity doesn’t equal sustainability, although it does contribute. Ultimately, innovation can be the key ingredient for sustainability. How popular is Facebook compared to MySpace? In my opinion, Facebook and MySpace are still considered to be in separate leagues mainly because of corporate ownership, user demographics, and the features offered. That said, let’s take a look at some fancy graphs, courtesy from Compete.
Not bad for FB. MS seems to be dropping lately.
Interesting. It appears around the time that MS deployed its new home page skins, PVs have dropped.
This numbers and graphs look pretty for Facebook, but they should know the giant they are up against. The only thing that [to me] MS offers that FB doesn’t is fully customizable profiles. While FB is easy — too easy — to add modules to their pages, it can inundate and take away the value of them for some users.
Conclusion
Is Facebook sustainable? Possibly. What they must do is offer valuable content to their users and listen to feedback. Listening can come in the form of Web analytics, user feedback, and even spot-testing new features with users. Looking at the PVs per visit, you can see MS has substantially dropped since they released their new home page skin … did they not poll their users enough? Were MySpacers looking for a more Web 2.0-ey interface? We won’t know ’till the end.
What do you think? Is Facebook sustainable as a prominent social network, or does it need to incubate some more?
Tags: facebook, myspace, Social Networking, sustainability, sustainable, techmeme, users, web 2.0, web analyticsError messages on the Web really do suck. Either they are too vague as to what the problem is, or not helpful enough after explaining the problem. Error messages today, have become the 404 pages of yesterday.
Current Status
Right now, error messages suck. They don’t tell the user what heck is going on, the Web site stealthily performs maintenance without letting users know (and thus breaking things). Users are left frustrated, confused, and simply will leave.
Take for instance, MySpace’s infamous generic error message, Sorry. an unexpected error occured. The page looks considerably drab, the advertisements work beautifully, and I am left all alone to reload the page over and over without understanding what’s happening. It never told me to wait X minutes to try again, it never told me to try to fix anything, and it never explained what caused it.
Alright, I know first hand, that error messages are usually difficult to explain cause they are always unexpected. Who expects error messages? LOL, I got a few suggestions on how MySpace could better communicate these problems to users, in a relaxed, yet informative way that might help ease frustration.
The Solution
Ok, first we establish some helpful messaging. Here’s what I propose:
Oops! It appears that our servers are having some trouble helping you send a message. You can try to clear your temporary files and try again, or give us a few minutes to wake the hamsters up.
Sorry for the trouble,
MySpace Staff
Ok, that’s a little better, don’t you think? It’s relaxed for the audience, it provides a helpful suggestion to fix it … but indeed, if it is a server problem, they can suggest to a user to try back in a few minutes.
So, here’s what I suggest that I looks like:
What do you think about my suggestion? Maybe you are an online provider and you mastered the art of online error messages? What works, what doesn’t? Leave some comments and let me know what you think.
Tags: Help, myspace, social media, UsabilitySorry! an unexpected error has occurred.This error has been forwarded to MySpace’s technical group.
Why do you do this, MySpace? I just wanted to check a message.
Tags: Help, myspace, RantsFrequently, I hunt for new social networking Web sites. MySpace feeling like a dull moment out of my generation, I wanted to find something different, that wasn’t a place for 13 year old emo kids. Not that they are bad, but I tend to not care much about how difficult their suburbia life is when they couldn’t go to a concert. Cold hearted, I know.
Shawn told me about CherryTAP. CherryTAP is different because it is intended for adults, and the theme is that you’re in a bar. I like that environment, because it allows people to have a more structured purpose there.
For instance, on Myspace, you made your page, customized it with a CSS layout, added your friends and messaged each other in a behavior like e-mail of yesterday. That’s pretty much it, very minimal focus on pushing users to do other things.
The target audience of CherryTAP is adult. I expected a million requests to be friends from well-endowed women, but I didn’t! For some reason, CherryTAP has grown without much interference from spammers. I like that. I can only wish them the best in holding it down as they continue to grow.
CherryTAP rewards users for their interaction (or other folks call it, “engagement”). For example, the more time you spend on the site, upload pictures, update your profile, comment on profiles, rate pictures — you earn points. While it may seem a little cheesy at first, after a little while you get that Endorphin kick for earning points and thus, more time spent on the site. The more Cherry Points you earn, the more features you unlock (like photos caps and more).
The overall appearance of the site is dark, but not gothic-looking. It does need some CSS hacks to clean it up and better organize it in my opinion. Being a fan of “build now, tweak later,” this site is definitely reaching their goal.
They’ve implemented the basic features of a “Hot or Not” site and have considerably primitive search functions. I expect as the site grows, they will meet the needs of their users. Let’s just hope they’re tracking the traffic activity on those areas to look for areas to improve.
Something unique to the social networking world that CherryTAP does well, is the ability to educate users of new widgets and tips on filling in their profile. Traditionally, most sites let users just free-form every pixel without having any guidance. From the looks of it, it appears to be genuine (organic) recommendations like Slide and others. Looks promising.
My personal experience with the site’s community is the users are nice and friendly. Maybe a bit too friendly for my liking, but that’s OK. As with many social networking sites, the folks who are singles want to mingle, and this site makes it easy for everyone to join.
In case anyone is wondering, I wrote this brief review on CherryTAP voluntarily, it happens to be they turned out good. If you want to suggest for me to voluntarily review your site, let me know and I just might get around to it. 