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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."
Granted, my research is strictly anecdotal, and I'm a catastrophically biased researcher in the first place, so you should probably mod me overrated even if I'm at -1.
But seriously, guys. I've noticed a much worse bug in facebook: Baby pictures.
I threw my entire life away because I knew I wouldn't be able to handle corporate culture. Every day some new father traipsing into work with photographic evidence of his inability to utilize birth control and demanding ritualistic expressions of adoration and amazement that he both figured out what to do with that dangly blood balloon and found a woman who didn't retch at the idea of aiding and abetting his genetic material's nefarious goals.
So now, here I am, unemployed and thinking about delivering pizzas again, at least safe in the knowledge that I'm free of retribution should some recent parent decide my emotional display didn't sate their narcissistic need for attention. Craigslist jobs section is getting boring. Let's see what hilarious inanity my friends have posted to their profiles.
Oh no.
Oh God no.
Is that a raisin? No, that's your purple, mucous covered mess of a clone fresh out of the vagina. A picture so offensive it wouldn't have even been acceptable in an office environment, but now thanks to the magic of facebook's YOU CARE ABOUT YOUR FRIEND'S FRIENDS LIVES policy is totally socially acceptable and rapidly becoming ubiquitous.
So now I have nothing. Is anyone hiring? I'll pretend your kids are cute.
no -____-
Peter and I didn't work for Slashcode.
In soviet Russia, God creates you!
+1...if I could.
Again Slashdot delivers slow, out-of-date news.
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Facebook doesn't care about users' privacy. Mark Zuckerburg has already said as much and his opinions on privacy are well known and oft repeated points of public controversy. It follows then that he doesn't much care for security either. In fact, it is likely that Mark is more concerned about competitors and would be rivals getting their hands on "his" data and beating him to the advertising punch than he is about the potential consequences for his users. This episode really shouldn't surprise anyone here on Slashdot because it fits neatly within the careless corporate culture of Facebook and their wanton disrespect for users or, as Zuckerberg has called them in the past, "dumbasses".