privacy

BEWARE: Foursquare Friend Request Phishing Scam

I just received the below, purporting to be a friend approval from a name i din't recognize.  It's a phising scam, hoping you all try not to open.  Not sure if the sender knew my foursquare account was attched to a specific email address, but they had me going, for sure.  If anyone wants the full headers, I will happily share.


Your privacy's fate: Sealed with a Click

I grabbed this just now on my Facebook home page: a sponsored Link with the Gmail/AOL/MSN logos, and my email address in bold, Thanking me?

Facebook_Gmail_ad.egg  on Aviary

I normally would have ignored it, but frankly I was curious. I clicked. The result, however, was insidious:

So now I can see what the plan is- Facebook wants to keep an eye on your Google account to make sure you don't connect to someone by email without also connecting them to Facebook.

It's hard to know what the cumulative effect of constant authorizations, approvals, and stored passwords really is, but I predict one day it sneaks up on you, an accidental overshare or ads that seem to insidiously follow you whenever you want?  A friend who lands on a site they hate, to find out that you praised it before you knew how much it would offend them? 

Or will it be merely the insidious, price-discriminatiung ad where you get to fly to Fort Lauderdale for $389, but your friend flies the same itinerary for $250 with a free checked bag?

Scary? Only sometimes.  But it all started with one click.