David Harley

Check Chain Mail and Hoaxes

Yesterday’s useful advice from a TV commentator on matters of IT security can be boiled down to this: if someone sends you a one-time passcode and tells you not to share it with anyone, then it’s a good idea not to share it with anyone. This sounds pretty obvious, but ... Read More

[You’ll probably see advertisements inserted by WordPress into this article. I don’t choose them or approve them – in fact, I don’t normally see them – but they’re the price I pay for not being able to afford (at present) to pay for all my blogs.] In January 2024, Snopes ... Read More

[Disclaimer: you’ll probably see ads under and possibly incorporated into articles on this blog. I don’t choose them and I don’t approve them: that’s the price I pay for not being able to afford to pay for all my blogs…] I’m amused to see that Amazon has excised the word ... Read More

I have spent a not-very-happy time this morning, besieged by Facebook group posts passed off as porn videos and trying to get rid of them. In fact, it’s unlikely that they’re either porn or videos: they’re bot postings of malicious links that are probably intended to steal credentials. It’s not ... Read More

[An extract from the forthcoming book ‘Facebook: Sins & Insensitivities’] The Tech Transparency Project claims to be ‘Holding Big Tech Accountable’ and tracks issues with Facebook, X, Google, Apple, Amazon et al. On 30th January 2024 it published a report – Meta Approves Harmful Teen Ads with Images from its ... Read More

I have, at best, an uneasy relationship with Facebook. To paraphrase something that I’m writing at the moment (more about that shortly): I first subscribed to Facebook because I was working in IT security research and needed to find out more about it, so I signed up to see how ... Read More

Having found myself roped into assisting as co-administrator a couple of Facebook groups with security/privacy issues, I thought I should, perhaps, share what little I know about defending your group against scam and spam posts and comments by tightening up group settings. Caveat: I’ve never really wanted to spend a ... Read More

I’ve been seeing an unpleasant scam attack being spread via a friend’s account today: I think from a cloned rather than hacked account, but I can’t be sure. 1. If you see a link to an article that apparently describes how Elon Musk is going to make UK residents rich… ... Read More

Facecrooks nails Facebook/Meta on (at least) two of its less attractive attributes. Firstly, its reliance on artificial intelligence, in this case using a faulty algorithm to correct a faulty algorithm. Presumably because AI works out cheaper than human eyes for fact-checking. Secondly, its lack of commitment to customer service. Its ... Read More

I’ve spent a lot of time recently writing about FB account cloning, simply because I come across it so often. I haven’t paid nearly so much attention to real account hacking because I don’t come across it nearly so often, However, having had occasion to look at it recently, it’s ... Read More