Cloud based data management

Spammers have seized control of a 1.5m user Facebook group.

A group campaigning against Facebook's redesign last year, entitled "5,000,000 against the new version of Facebook", has been taken over by get rich quick spammers, who have plastered the group's page with ads. The stated aims of the group have shifted as a result of the takeover, as a description of its objectives on the page demonstrate.

Links on the page redirect surfers to get rich quick tips and speed seduction websites. Legitimate posts have been deluged by the dubious product punts in much the same way that some newsgroup groups were turned into wastelands of rubbish years ago.

Quite how scallywags took over the Facebook group, which appears to have lapsed into neglect, remains unclear. What is clear is that squatting spammers are now calling the shots.

"Spammers are leaving marketing messages and web links strewn across the Facebook group like the graffiti left by teenagers in an abandoned house," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at security firm Sophos.

"If you're on Facebook, maybe now would be a good time to return to some of the groups you may have joined long ago and don't visit anymore, and decide if you want to permanently cut your ties."

At the time of writing on Wednesday morning, the group is unavailable, perhaps in response to Sophos's exposure of it as a haven for spamming. Screenshots of the group, and more details on its operations can be found in a blog posting by Sophos's Cluley here. ®

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