'OMG' Facebook Scam Doesn't Let You See Who Viewed Your Profile
Yet another scam is making its way around Facebook, and it's affecting a disturbingly high number of users. As Sophos explains, the scam is spreading via Wall posts that read: "OMG OMG OMG... I cant believe this actually works! Now you really can see who viewed your profile!" Once the attached link is clicked, you're redirected to a rogue application that requests access to your Facebook pages. If you grant access to the app, however, you'll inadvertently spam all your other Facebook friends with the exact same message. (And you'll never find out who's looking at your Facebook profile.)
The formula behind this scam is pretty simple: to bait users with a feature that doesn't currently exist on Facebook, and to let them spread the spam to all their friends. It's the same, age-old recipe behind the scams offering dislike buttons and background customization, but the Facebook community, for whatever reason, continues to fall for it. So far, some 60,000 users have already been sucked into the latest scam to hit the social network -- which, unfortunately, will only embolden other online con artists.
The easy solution, as always, is to not click on the link in the first place, and to warn your friends about it. But, if you've already been targeted, Sophos recommends that you remove all traces of the scam from your newsfeed, and disable all rogue applications from accessing your personal information via your Facebook Privacy Settings menu.
The formula behind this scam is pretty simple: to bait users with a feature that doesn't currently exist on Facebook, and to let them spread the spam to all their friends. It's the same, age-old recipe behind the scams offering dislike buttons and background customization, but the Facebook community, for whatever reason, continues to fall for it. So far, some 60,000 users have already been sucked into the latest scam to hit the social network -- which, unfortunately, will only embolden other online con artists.
The easy solution, as always, is to not click on the link in the first place, and to warn your friends about it. But, if you've already been targeted, Sophos recommends that you remove all traces of the scam from your newsfeed, and disable all rogue applications from accessing your personal information via your Facebook Privacy Settings menu.
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