Social Network Account Spoofing

Users of Facebook, LinkedIn and other social networks are vulnerable to attacks that rely on account spoofing. A scammer poses as either someone you know or a friend of a friend, in order to fool you into revealing personal information. He then uses that information to gain access to your other accounts and eventually steal your identity.

In a typical exploit, says Joffe, someone contacts you on a site like Facebook or LinkedIn, pretending to be a friend of a friend or a co-worker of someone you trust. Then, this new "friend" contacts you directly through text message or email. The correspondence seems legitimate because you believe he has a connection with an individual you trust.

In another scenario, a scammer might impersonate someone you already know -- claiming to be an old friend from high school, for instance. Spoofers can find out your connections by following your public feeds or looking up the names of co-workers on sites like LinkedIn, where you've posted your work information.

Once the scammer has established a connection with you, he uses devious means to steal personal data, such as chatting online to find out the names of your family members, favorite bands, hobbies and other seemingly innocuous information. Then he uses that information to try to guess your passwords or answers to security questions for banking sites, webmail accounts or other online services.

Morehouse describes another type of attack that targets companies as well as individuals. The spoofer might set up a Facebook page that claims to be the official company page for, say, a major retailer. The spoofer might claim that the page is a formal method to contact the company or register complaints.

The page might offer fake coupons to entice people to join, and it soon goes viral as people share it with their friends. Once hundreds or thousands of users have joined the page, says Morehouse, the owner tricks them into giving out personal information, perhaps by signing up for additional coupons or special offers.

This ends up being a double attack: Consumers are harmed because their personal data is compromised, and the company is harmed because its customers now associate the fake Facebook page with the real company -- and decide not to buy from that company anymore.

Joffe says there is no way to prevent a criminal from setting up a fake Facebook page, but companies can use monitoring tools such as Social Mention to see how the company name is being used online. If an unauthorized page turns up, companies can ask the social network to remove the fake listing.

November 21, 2011 (Computerworld)