Facebook Bug Could Give Spammers Names, Photos

angry tapir writes with this excerpt from an IDG report: "Facebook is scrambling to fix a bug in its website that could be misused by spammers to harvest user names and photographs. It turns out that if someone enters the e-mail address of a Facebook user along with the wrong password, Facebook returns a special 'Please re-enter your password' page, which includes the Facebook photo and full name of the person associated with the address. A spammer with an e-mail list could write a script that enters the e-mail addresses into Facebook and then logs the real names. This could help make a phishing attack more realistic."

Comments

*Smack Face*

[Monkeedude1212]

Seriously? Who is freaking writing these web pages? It would have been easier to NOT include photo's and names than to build it in there!

Re:*Smack Face*

[odies]

I think the summary and story is looking at wrong aspect about it too. Spammers, whatever. You're just one in a million. This is a lot more serious about people that just know your email, but are in more personal contact with you than some spammers. Website owners, forum administrator, people you meet on the internet.. Those who know your email but don't really know your real identity. That's a lot more serious privacy violation.

Re:*Smack Face*

[yenne]

I just tried it. Looks to me like Facebook has a problem with users who enter the wrong e-mail address and can't figure out why their logon isn't working. Hence, the "Not you? Click here." option beside the picture.

It's entirely possible that the idiocy behind the interface design is in an ongoing stupidity arms race with the consumers on the other end.

Not The Only Problem

[Revotron]

Fixing this alone means nothing. If you search for someone on Facebook it will show you a name and a profile picture. Sure, it requires a facebook account, but that's not too hard to create for somebody with 4,000,000 email addresses.

Re:Not The Only Problem

[natehoy]

This means a lot if you have set your profile to be non-searchable and set your name and/or profile picture to be "visible to friends only".

POTS analogy: This is like going to the effort of getting an "unlisted number", where you aren't supposed to be listed in the phone book and your address is not supposed to be divulged to anyone, then finding out that anyone who happens upon your number and dials it gets a recording that includes your name and address.

Having said that, everything you enter in Facebook should be considered viewable by everyone on the planet. Facebook doesn't exactly have a long and reliable history of protecting the identity of the people who use it. They'd sell you for a nickel. They'd probably send someone to strangle your cat if they thought your angst-ridden posts would generate a few thousand more page views. It's not exactly like this should come as a surprise to anyone, especially those of us who actually use it.

So, as someone mentioned above - this is a very, very serious bug to Facebook. This information should NEVER be given out to anyone... who isn't paying for it.