We all know, and expect, to see ads when we hit the movies for that latest blockbuster – the “pre-show” as it’s called, is of course advertisement and you know, and again expect, it to be around 15-20 minutes long – it’s a long running tradition and we’re generally ok with it. does it stop us from hitting the movies on a friday/saturday evening with your partner? no, most likely it wont.
We also know that web sites, blogs, forums et al contain adverts – in most cases they’re non-intrusive – in some they actually block you from entering the site proper before you either have to find a “skip this crap” link or watch it all to the end – does it stop us from visiting our favourite web sites/blogs? no, most likely it wont.
Then there’s of course the emails – we know, and still expect, to get hit with ads at some stage – either solicited or unsolicited. Some more than others. does it stop us from using email? no, most likely it wont.
Now, since this phenomenon took hold – well, say sometime last week – social media…that’s your MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter et al – ads are becoming more and more frequent – we still know, and still expect, there to be ads. does it stop us from using it? no, most likely it wont. However, the “owners” of these social media fads needs to spend an enormous amount of time/resources in battling spammers.
Yeps, we all have a love/hate relationship with them – in some cases the spammers are becoming more and more ingenious and are using phishing techniques to try to get hold of your account details, contact lists, friends lists et al – undermining the general “trust” your nearest contacts has in you – and i say you because more and more often, you can identify yourself with both your RL identity and your online identity. Hell, i have gaming friends that, even though knowing my real name, still calls me by my gamer tag.
So, since the connection between your identities are closely connected in many cases, hijacking your Facebook account is pretty much close to identity fraud.
We know the dangers – it’s nothing new…don’t click on links from people you don’t know/trust (insert caveat here)…don’t open that email attachment from that nice gentleman in Nigeria…those free pills and porn access links probably shouldn’t be investigated further while you wait for that download to finish.
Yet it’s still happening – very, very often at that…sometimes with malicious intent…sometimes to make a statement…but mostly, it’s done with a financial incentive in mind.
Of course, having the most secure password isn’t going to help us out much if we’re silly enough to hand it out to every person/site who asks.
Twitter is seeing a LOT of phishing and spamming going on these days – even direct messages from people you don’t follow (that’s supposedly a prerequisite). the most common one is the “mention” type spam.
Basically a list of followers are scraped using an account on Twitter – and then it just goes through that list and tweet to you and voila, since your Twitter client, in most cases, has the “mention” tweets, you’ll be seeing it.
So, we expect the ads, and in some cases the spam – are we going to stop using social media anytime soon, even knowing the dangers involved both from a “trust” and “identity” perspective?
no, most likely not….