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Are We Seeing the First Facebook "Worm"?

Posted on March 25, 2008 by jessestay

Today I received some interesting wall posts that claimed to be from my Aunt. The first looked like the following:

hey do me a favor and try the new crush calculator, don’t worry its not some annoying facebook application that makes you invite all your friends, the crush calc works with your mobile phone and it uses a special scientific way to find the person near you that has a crush on you, guess what? it actually worked, for me and 4 friends, yes this is for real you gotta see this, try it right now and see for yourself, its too crazy. http://www.fkgcp.com

The second looked like this:

i finally found the best source out there for all the latest ringtines for my phone at http://www.vyzxw.com they dont sound bad like the ones from my actual phone company, these are 100 times better and they have thousands and thousands of ringers to choose from and when you use them the first time you get 20 free ringtones. stop paying so much for your ringtones,don’t be a sucker, get them from my place, http://www.vyzxw.com

I checked with my Aunt, and she thinks someone may have stolen her password and hijacked her account to send out those messages to all her friends. My brother got a few of these posted to his wall as well from her Account. I also noticed that her status was changed to, “totally hooked on the crush calculator”.

Then, I did some research on Google for “crush calculator” and came up with this article on CNet. It appears that there used to be an Application on Facebook called “Secret Crush” that would install Spyware on peoples’ computers. Facebook quickly removed the application, but it appears they may be retaliating.

Doing a search for “crush calculator” on Facebook reveals a few groups users on Facebook have set up to apologize to their friends for someone hacking into their account and sending messages to all their friends about the “Crush Calculator”.

So, this could be a few things:

Could the Zango application have been installed on these users and they are now using that retrieved Facebook data to hack into users’ accounts, scrape the Wall, and post to all of their friends’ walls?

People related to “Secret Crush” are retaliating, finding easy passwords, and hacking accounts to send messages to all the friends of a user and get those users to go to the sites listed above.

Third-party hackers are getting paid to hack into these accounts and send out messages.

This could truly be one of the first “Social Worms”, instead of circling the internet, following your list of friends and their friends, spreading as it harvests information from those profiles for more damage in other areas.

It’s also very interesting that since I was now known to this “hacker”, or “worm”, whichever it may be, I am now for some reason getting lots of spam Skype messages. The only place I really list this in the open is on my Facebook profile, which is only visible to my Facebook friends. Could they have harvested my information as well? A social worm is truly dangerous!

There is nothing stopping one of these applications from collecting a bunch of user data and sending messages out to each of the friends of the users that added the application. Facebook does track this and puts a quick end to them, but just like any other application you install on your computer, you have to be careful of the Applications you install on your Facebook account! Verify that you know the sending user well, and ask them their experiences first.

Most of all, check your passwords! Be sure you always have a strong password for your Facebook login, and this probably won’t happen to you. Have any of you experienced similar issues?

I’m On Facebook–Now What??? Makes the New York Times

Posted on March 3, 2008 by jessestay

My Google Alerts notified me yesterday that the book I wrote with Jason Alba, “I’m On Facebook–Now What???” was featured in the New York Times. The New York Times was interviewing my co-author on new ways to find a job if your current methods aren’t working. It was a brief mention, just stating Jason was the co-author, but a mention, nonetheless! Now to just make that best-seller list!

Want to learn more about what you can do with Facebook? Check it out on our Facebook Page and become a Fan!: http://page.facebookadvice.com

Amazon, the Social Network?

Posted on February 10, 2008 by jessestay

Did you know Amazon has a Social Network?Â In fact, it’s pretty robust!Â In Amazon, if you click “(your name)’s Amazon”, then “Your Profile”, you have the option to set up a profile, including a biography, information about yourself, and get this – a list of all your friends currently on Amazon.com. It can show your recent purchases, your favorite items, your wish list, and more. It even gives you a blog in which you can send messages to those that are friends with you. You can also import your own blog’s rss into the blog feed. Amazon has even MySpace beat, with an activity feed of recent activity by your friends.

The real power comes for authors. As an author, I can have people add me as a friend, and I can keep an open dialog with my readers. I can introduce deals, notify when new editions of the book are released, and more. You can see my favorite books, movies, and music, my wishlist, and my biography. You can also see the other books I have written. Amazon also lets you verify through a publisher or agent that a book was written by you, so your books on Amazon can link back to your profile.

Amazon has quite a tool here that I wouldn’t put past them building on in the future. If you think the MySpace OpenSocial announcement was big, imagine if Amazon were to embrace an API such as OpenSocial. In the USA alone, Amazon has over 60 million members in its network. Each one of those members is tied to a bank account of some sort and has probably bought something at some point from the site. Add to that the existing APIs Amazon provides, allowing users to query the Amazon database, associate affiliate IDs and sell items based on commission, Amazon could have the first proven revenue model for a Social Network.

Amazon and Google aren’t the best of friends. Would Amazon embrace Google’s OpenSocial, or create their own as they have through Amazon AWS? Visit my Profile and add me as a friend on Amazon!:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile/A1NYWKPQAI1F5R

The Book is Off to the Press, but Wait — There’s More!

Posted on February 1, 2008 by jessestay

I’m extremely happy and relieved to say that “I’m on Facebook — Now What???” is off to the press, and the eBook is now available for purchase on the HappyAbout.info site.Â It has been a long time coming, but we’re finished!Â “I’m on Facebook — Now What???” is now officially one of the first books of its type available for sale, anywhere.Â Jason and I are pretty proud of that, and hope you enjoy it as much as we have enjoyed writing it.Â If you’ve pre-ordered an eCopy, you have probably already received it, or will receive it in the next day.Â Purchase your copy here!

We love reviews!Â If you have a short review, we’ll post a link to Amazon.com for the book as soon as it is up, and you can post your reviews there.Â The more reviews we have there I am told increases our visibility on Amazon, so feel free to write one up, but save it for when I post it here.Â Also, you may start blogging about the book now!Â Our publisher has a terrific affiliate program, so if you’d like to make a little money off of your review in your blog, you can do so here.Â Also, don’t forget to add yourself as a fan to the Facebook Page, and subscribe to our blog at FacebookAdvice.com!Â Thanks again to Jason for his hard work and example in writing the book – he has been an excellent co-author to work with.Â Also, thanks to Lorenzen and Scoble for their great contributions to the Foreward and Afterward!

Wait, there’s more…

I’ve had so much fun writing this book, that I’ve decided to write another one.Â Today, I just signed a contract with O’Reilly to write what will be probably the first published manual on Facebook FBML.Â It will be a “small animals” book, which means it won’t quite be a full sized book, but it’s not quite a Pocket Reference either.Â It will most likely be called, “FBML Essentials”.Â So, if you’re a developer, anxious to develop Facebook applications, stay tuned!Â I will probably be putting together a separate site for that book too, similar to what we have done for facebookadvice.com.Â Please, feel free to share below your frustrations with Facebook development – I’d love to hear the most common complaints and perhaps resolve those in the book!

O’Reilly is also helping me get to Graphing Social Patterns West (no one has invited me to speak though, sorry – I am open for speaking engagements while I’m out there though!) March 3-4.Â If I get any other appointments I might leave earlier in the week, so feel free to book me for your user group meetings, radio, TV, podcasts, or whatever while I’m out in the L.A./San Diego area (that is my home away from home, as my grandparents live there)!

SocialToo.com — Your Companion to the Social Web

Posted on January 5, 2008 by jessestay

I’ve been working on a little side project lately, that I think will solve a lot of the headaches caused by lack of certain features in the Social Landscape. In the spirit of the book Jason and I are writing, my company, SocialOptimize.com is announcing the beta launch of SocialToo.com. What is it? It is intended to be a companion to the Social Web – the features you can’t find in the social landscape you will find here. Will it replace your Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIn or Plaxo account? Probably not, but it will make your experience in those Social Networks much better and compliment that experience.

Over the coming weeks (I have a strong release early, release often policy), you’ll see new features launched on the site that will make your Social experience better. The site is still very basic, but as a taste of what’s to come, for all those that sign up now we’ll enable auto following of all those that follow you on Twitter. Within the next week we’ll add the ability to blacklist those that follow you (so it doesn’t follow them). Soon after that we’ll add statistics, better bulk operations on your followers and following, and many more features. Soon we’ll start to incorporate Facebook data, linking your Twitter account with your Facebook account. After that, maybe Plaxo, or MySpace, or LinkedIn. These are all ideas of where we’re going with this.

So, I encourage all to register to find out what’s to come. Again, all those that register with their Twitter username and password will be automatically given auto-follow capabilities on their Twitter account! Keep following here and I’ll update as we progress.

Plaxo’s Mistake Costs Scoble His Facebook Account

Posted on January 3, 2008 by jessestay

There’s a storm a brewin’ in the Bay Area today, and it’s not just those rain clouds coming their way! For those following the Twitter Storm, and Scoble’s blog, Scoble was banned from Facebook today due to some testing he was doing with an unreleased version of Plaxo Pulse. While Scoble is understandably upset, I think he is unfairly putting the blame on Facebook.

In the book, we quote a point in the Terms of Service which says that you “[can’t] use automated scripts to collect information from or otherwise interact with the Service or the Site;” It would appear that Scoble might be better off blaming those at Plaxo that he trusted to have read that before giving him a script that explicitely violates the agreement. I think Scoble’s blame of Facebook is somewhat unfair. I hope Plaxo has apologized profusely to Scoble!

Here’s what I think Facebook should do in the future, now that another publicity nightmare is ensuing:

Of course, they should reinstate Scoble’s account – maybe a slap on the hand with an explanation for the rule if you still can’t allow that practice, but Scoble’s account should have never been disabled in the first place!

Whitelist Scoble, and any other A-list blogger from all your disable scripts! – Do this now! Scoble is not the first, and I guarantee won’t be the last if you keep doing this!

Work with Plaxo on an acceptable solution to the problem Scoble is trying to address – this could be an excellent opportunity to calm the waters, work with the two parties, and solve an issue of one of your biggest users and supporters

Disable the 5,000 limit for all those whitelisted above – Twitter has exceptions to their API and request limits, why can’t Facebook? All those generating serious traffic to Facebook should be treated as royalty IMO. Scoble deserves much better treatment.

What I think will come of all of this is I think something will finally be done to address some of the biggest issues facing Facebook today. I think finally some sort of Export method will be allowed for contacts (with privacy limits, I’m sure!). I also think the 5,000 friend limit will finally be lifted for Scoble, and the traffic on his site will more than double over today and as the situation unfolds.