MySpace profile hack provides early warning to predators
Unplugged 'system error'
A security issue on MySpace may put a spanner in the works of law-enforcement efforts to track miscreants using the social networking site.
Many MySpace profiles contain code that subscribes visitors to a profile's video channel. Normally this is all well and good, but hackers are able to subvert the feature for filthy purposes, according to Chris Boyd, security research manager at FaceTime Communications.
Hackers have set up dozens of accounts used as a springboard for spamming or attempts to vandalise other profiles.
The feature (used in conjunction with an IP address tracker) might also be employed by predators to keep tabs on anyone who might be tracking their activities, Boyd says. Although MySpace has made attempts to prohibit the use of IP trackers, miscreants have found a way around these blocks.
Crackers "are using every trick in the book they can to know who is watching them," Boyd said.
In particular, the feature could be used by predators to detect if their attempts to groom youngsters have come to the attention of law enforcement, potentially curtailing or frustrating evidence in child abuse investigations.
The tactic has been in play since at least October 2007. MySpace was informed of the issue in late March but is yet to act. According to Boyd, the social networking site has responded to his concerns about the issue by describing it as a "system error".
Pending a fix from MySpace itself, Boyd has posted advice to surfers about how to avoid tracking here, a tip child abuse investigators might well find useful. ®
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COMMENTS
MySpace Code is Garbage
I have a MySpace account because there's a community in which I participate.
Besides the astoundingly ugly pages full of escort ser-, er dating service Flash ads, there seems to be a system error that pops up at least three or four times during any visit. Responses to most bulletins get eaten by the Langoliers, and the posts get messed up in a huge way. Also, that 'orrible "phishing cure" that redirects to a warning page has SERIOUS bugs. It really messes up posts and group pages.
Paris, because MySpace is the pubic [sic] strumpet of the Internets (and we don't have a garbage can icon).
lies
We sheeple know that there are predators around every street corner, in our parks, on every computer, the intorweb is infested with them! We know this! If you're over 18 and use a machine and arn't with us then you're obvously one of them! We need internet tracking on all the ISP's so that we can find all of the predators!
Predators didn't exist until the intorweb was made - now they have complex clubs, with social nights and parties! It's all the introwebs fault and you must all be tracked!
As an aside
I remember an instances of a peadophile wanting chemical castration but the law types refusing treatment becouse it wasn't economical and so - shockingly the peadophile reoffended (child pronz offences I think.)
Noscripts?
Wouldn't noscript avoid this?
http://noscript.net/
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