I avoid Facebook surveys at all costs because they are usually stupid, boring, and — if you didn’t already know — dangerous. Here’s something to prove it:This one was sent to me a few minutes ago from my friend, Kevin Kosh, who does PR for security vendor Sophos. You should also read an article my colleague Joan Goodchild wrote recently called “Social Media Risks: The Basics.” Trust me. It’ll make you smarter.Now for that alert from Sophos…MEDIA ALERT INCREASING NUMBER OF SURVEY SCAMS CONTINUING TO SPREAD ON FACEBOOK, SOPHOS WARNS– Hundreds of thousands of Facebook users hit by resurgence of “Girl killed herself” scam this weekend IT security and control firm Sophos is warning Facebook users about the reappearance of survey scams that are quickly spreading across the social network. Many Facebook users are struggling to clean up their accounts once they’ve been tricked into allowing a third party application to post messages from their profile.These scams are able to spread across the network as users think that online friends have posted the message, seemingly linkining to the enticing material.However, by clicking on the link and giving a third-party Facebook application access to their profile, users are helping the scammers to spread the application across their network of friends.Typical scams include messages that read:“OMG this girl KILLED herself after her dad posted on her wall: LINK”“Amazing how such a harmless prank could cause something so bad!: LINK” “OMG OMG OMG…I cant believe this actually works! Now you really can see who viewed your profile! LINK”Sophos has created a YouTube video, which sites are free to embed, to help Facebook users clear up their profiles if they’ve been affected by any of these scams:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Or-qR0Y300w“We’ve received an extremely large number of messages this weekend from worried Facebook users who are trying to remove these applications from their profiles once they’ve been affected by the scams,” said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos. “The safest way to protect yourself from such scams, is to not click on unknown links in the first place, even if you think they’ve been posted by a friend. If you have fallen for these tricks though, it’s important to remove the applications completely, not just the wall posts, to ensure that you’re not helping the bad guys to spread the scam further.” Sophos’s Facebook group, which warns of emerging threats on Facebook, can be found at:http://www.facebook.com/SophosSecurityMore information about the attack, including the video, can be found on Sophos’s Naked Security blog at:http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2010/12/20/how-to-clean-up-your-profile–Bill Brenner Related content news Gwinnett Medical Center investigating possible data breach After being contacted by Salted Hash, Gwinnett Medical Center has confirmed they're investigating a security incident By Steve Ragan Oct 02, 2018 6 mins Regulation Data Breach Hacking news Facebook: 30 million accounts impacted by security flaw (updated) In a blog post, Facebook’s VP of product management Guy Rosen said the attackers exploited a flaw in the website's 'View As' function By Steve Ragan Sep 28, 2018 4 mins Data Breach Security news Scammers pose as CNN's Wolf Blitzer, target security professionals Did they really think this would work? By Steve Ragan Sep 04, 2018 2 mins Phishing Social Engineering Security news Congress pushes MITRE to fix CVE program, suggests regular reviews and stable funding After a year of investigation into the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) program, the Energy and Commerce Committee has some suggestions as to how it can be improved By Steve Ragan Aug 27, 2018 3 mins Vulnerabilities Security Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe