- Mythbuster busts his own tale
- 10 open source companies to watch
- Sony recalls 73,000 Vaio laptops
- Tool to evade China's Web censorship
- Chrome and Firefox and add-ons
Newsletters | Podcasts | Chats | Opinions | RSS Feeds | This Week In Print | IT Careers | Community | Reports | Downloads | Slideshows | New Data Center
Partner Sites:App Performance | On Demand Security | Networking Solution | SOA | Value of WDS
A glitch in a test version of Facebook's Web site inadvertently exposed the birthdays of Facebook's 80 million members this week.
The bug was discovered over the weekend by Sophos Senior Technology Consultant Graham Cluley. While checking out Facebook's new design, Cluley noticed that the birth dates of some of his privacy-obsessed acquaintances were popping up when they should have been hidden.
Facebook allows users to control who sees private information such as their birth date, which can be a valuable nugget of data for identity thieves. But Cluley discovered that the new site was making this information public to other members. "Their new profile page essentially ignored the privacy setting to withhold the data of birth," he said.
"For a brief period of time, a small number of users were able to access a private beta of Facebook's new site design meant only for developers. During that time, some of those users had their birthdays revealed due to a bug," Facebook said Wednesday in a statement. The company could not say exactly how long this data was exposed or how many people viewed the beta site, but the bug was patched within hours of Cluley's discovery.
Facebook may intend for the beta site to be private, but it has been open to the general public for several days. It features a new profile design that should be rolled out as an option to Facebook users some time this week.
Cluley himself did not consider this a major data breach, but he said it should serve as a warning to people who put a lot of information on social networks. "It raises a more serious question which is, 'Can you trust these social networks to look after your data properly?'" he said.
Facebook is sensitive about privacy. In November the company scrambled to fix its Beacon ad system after a CA researcher discovered that the system was collecting data on users' online behavior, despite Facebook's assurances to the contrary.
"With Beacon we just screwed it up," said Matt Cohler, the company's vice president of product management, during a March session with reporters.
Cluley isn't sure that won't happen again. He's telling his friends to just make up a birth date on Facebook from now on.
Rss FeedRss Feed
Gartner summarizes its view on Application Delivery Controllers, evaluates strengths and weaknesses...
Vulnerability Management For DummiesDownload this concise book "Vulnerability Management for Dummies," to learn about the simple steps...
The ROI and TCO Benefits of Data Deduplication for Data Protection in the EnterpriseThis paper examines and quantifies the costs and benefits of backup with deduplication storage as...
Life on the edge of your WAN has changed dramatically. With the need to deliver advanced services,...
PoE Plus: Impact on the PoE MarketThe standard for Power over Ethernet (PoE), IEEE Std. 802.3af(tm)-2003, advanced networking,...
Harnessing the power of communications to increase workplace performanceDue to the convergence of IT and telecommunications technologies, the business workplace has been...
We have so many holes punched in our firewalls today that many industry insiders question the value...
The self-managed networkWe aren't there yet, but advances in network and systems management tools are making it possible to...
| NetworkWorld, Inc. | About Network World, Inc. | Advertise | Careers | Contact us | Terms of Service/Privacy | Reprints and links | Partnerships | Press room | Subscribe to NW |
| IDG, Inc. | CIO | Computerworld | CSO | Demo | GamePro | Games.net | IDGconnect.com | IDG World Expo | Infoworld | JavaWorld.com | LinuxWorld.com | MacUser | Macworld | PC World | Playlistmag.com | The Industry Standard | IDG List Services | IDG TechNetwork |
 |
Copyright © 1994-2008 Network World, Inc. All rights reserved. |
Partner Content
Brilliantly simple security and control solutions for email, web and endpoint
www.sophos.com
Stopping data leakage
Learn how to exploit your current security investment to control the information that flows into, through and out of your network.
Download the white paper.
Why detection rates aren't enough
Evaluating endpoint security products is a time-consuming and daunting task. Learn the six critical questions you need to ask prospective vendors to get the right endpoint solution.
Download the white paper.
Applications: taking back control
Employees installing unauthorized applications is a growing threat to business security and productivity. Cost-effectively reduce this threat by integrating control into your malware protection.
Learn more today.
Comment