Poor Facebook. The social networking site is facing a wave of spam and is making seirous efforts to tackle it, including joining industry-wide efforts to fight it. Yet at the same time it appears that its “People You May Know” algorithm could be inadvertently aiding and abetting the spread of spam. Oh dear.
A blog post by Sean at anti-virus firm F-Secure details his discovery that the people recommended to him in the “People You May Know” box were spam accounts. The name Elma Fewell, one of the two recommended profiles, yielded quite a few doppelgängers when he did a search. Looking at incremental Facebook IDs turned up even more. All of the accounts were created on Wednesday, August 11.
F-Secure found several names being used for spam accounts. They all had profile pictures of attractive young women, possibly Ukrainian models according to a reverse image search. Some of the spam links included “A deal you just can’t refuse!”, “Check this out!” and “Do not pay for a new iphone 4, get one for free one for no cost!”.
The links led to a LiveJournal page with an iPhone 4 bait ad. When the author clicked through he found he was redirected to play Berlin-based Frogster’s Bounty Bay Online game. He gave Frogster the benefit of the doubt for what its marketing affiliates were doing and said the German office of F-Secure would let them know.
The F-Secure blog post suggests that Facebook must be using algorithms based on profile search history for its “People You May Know” recommendations. If true, this doesn’t seem like a very sensible approach to me. I want the recommendations to be about people I may actually know so basing it on some sort of friends of friends algorithm would make more sense. Twitter is where I follow people I don’t know but I try to keep Facebook personal.
Certainly the F-Secure suggestion of being able to periodically purge your search history like you can on Google and in browsers would be a good move. One search for the word “iPhone” shouldn’t mean you are recommended spam accounts forever more.
I’ve reached out to Facebook to see if they have any comment on this and will update the story if they do.
UPDATE: A Facebook spokesman has responded with details of how the site detects and removes spam profiles. He said that the algorithm for ‘People You May Know’ did not involve search history but was constantly being tweaked for best results.
“Profiles that are created under a false identity or that attempt to trick people into taking a certain action violate our policies, and we have a large team of professional investigators who remove these when we detect them or they’re reported to us by the people who use Facebook,” the spokesman said.
“We also have technical systems in place to flag and block potential fake profiles based on signals like name and anomalous site activity. Profiles that send lots of messages to non-friends, for example, or whose friend requests are ignored at a high rate, are marked as suspect and either automatically blocked or disabled, or put into a queue for further review.”
He added: “Our “Suggestions” feature uses a variety of factors to determine which people who are already on Facebook a specific person might want to connect with. It does not use search history. We’re constantly refining and improving our features and systems, including this one, to provide the best possible experience for the people who use Facebook.”
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OMG. Is this true?
I always receive messages in my e-email saying that I won a prize. Sometimes i received 3 in a day from different people but the same message. I am wondering that how do they know my email address.
This is an example of message they sent on me. Is this a spam?
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Survey Length: 5 Minutes
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Click or copy and paste the following link into your browser if the button does not function: http://tracking.surveyclub.com/aff_c?offer_id=25&...
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Comment by Filipino Internet Us — August 25, 2010 @ 9:13 am
More and more brands need to expose themselves on Facebook and the huge audience that seems to reside there all day from the comfort of their office chair. This has always been a risk to businesses with any of these services that allow others to tag photos. (flickr for example). Check out apps.pxspot.com coming soon!!!
Comment by Mark — August 25, 2010 @ 11:36 am
Their engineers are idiots. I've reported a fake profile long ago that's still on there and has had no activity for months, yet collected 400 friends who are mostly in college networks by claiming to be a future college student and listing a university on its profile. They've done nothing despite repeated reporting of it. And it's clear it's a fake acct because of the nonsensical BS it posts on its wall and failure to reply to other students wall postings.
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I've been msging the students whose network I am in and warning them it's a fake email harvesting profile, and most have unfriended it.
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Another screwup they don't take into acct is the accts that are created, then immediately "like" and spam page walls and have no wall posts on their own profile, or have nonsensical ramblings like "can somebody make me happy". The people who friend these profiles are truly the ones who need to be removed from the gene pool, esp if you fail to do your duty and report the damn things as fake. You think someone with a picture like that is really going to waste their time with you on FB? They have a job and a life, they're not going to be chatting with you idiots. Their picture has been stolen and used. Wise up, you stupid gits.
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FB doesn't seem to give a rip. They don't personally monitor these things. It's all automated. When enough people report the profile or it only takes 1 report because it's obvious that it's fake, then it gets removed. But if it only take 1 person to report it because it's that obvious, why the hell didn't the automated systems delete it instantly. I've reported numerous accts and had them deleted instantly upon refreshing the profile page. Also ask why can't they ban people who spam walls with "add me up guys" etc. Obvious spam and should be forbidden. This isn't a random dating site.
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How the mighty have fallen since opening up to commoner email accts. Like one past article explained, spam is not going to be curbed. They've tried and failed. The only way is to be on a site where you know everyone and everyone only has ONE verified email for use on the site. FB used to be that way, now it's garbage and is why I had to switch to other college email required sites.
Comment by Guest — August 26, 2010 @ 2:33 am
a) Facebook isn't a legitimate network. It's destabilizing, and I have a feeling something looms for them. http://www.hrabaconsulting.com/blog/2010/06/21/hi...
b) Facebook users are dumb as bricks, and it suggests something very bad will go viral because those users just don't get it. This: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/how_google_f...
that came from this hilarious and painfully sad login debacle:
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebook_wan...
If users are googling "facebook login" to then login, I am thinking the majority of web users aren't aware of URLS, scams, etc. They just refuse to learn, or voluntarily plead ignorance.
It's a problem for FB.
Comment by hhotelconsult — August 27, 2010 @ 5:12 am
[...] It has the Facebook color scheme, fonts, button design, and other elements. It even says you have a friend request from this girl, who apparently has two friends in common with [...]
Pingback by WARNING: Facebook-Emulating Ad Spam Is Growing — July 29, 2011 @ 9:41 am
thanks a lot for this information..
truth is not good to rely so much on someone s facebook there are many who take advantage of the ingenuity of people..
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Comment by Desarrollo Personal — January 8, 2012 @ 1:00 pm