Scam Alert: Latest Facebook Phishing Scam Asks You If You Remember This Photo

Hackers can get very creative when it comes to trying to steal your account information. They attempt to lure you in by using sob stories and try to get you to sign in on fake log-in pages so they can hijack your account and use your personal information to access your bank accounts and maybe even steal your identity.

One of the most common hacking methods being used these days is phishing. It's basically an attempt to acquire usernames, passwords, and even credit card information by creating authentic-looking forms and pages where users will inadvertently end up sending their account details direct to the hackers.

These scams are becoming more and more widespread, especially on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. The latest phishing scam to hit Facebook is a sneaky one: clueless users are asked to click on a link that purportedly leads to a photo that they might have seen before. Before the image is displayed, users are asked to log in to the site once more. The thing is, no such picture exists, and what happens instead is that hackers will now have access to your account because you just literally handed your account log-in details over to them.

The text that accompanies a vague-looking images says something like "hey, do you remember this photo?" or "Can you remember this photo?" or "Remember this photo?" It is then followed by a link to a fake Facebook log-in page.

This is what Facebook says will happen next:

The scam message will be accompanied by a bit.ly or other link of some kind. Clicking on any of them will take you a page designed to look like the Facebook login page. Users who let their guard down or who aren't paying careful attention, may not notice they have been redirected to a scam site. Obviously, if you login on this screen, the scammers can gain total access to your account.

-- Facebook

So here's some advice to keep your account secure and keep it from getting compromise: don't click on every link that your friends share on the network, check the URL on the browser before entering your log-in details, and make sure to report scams (and spread the word about it) when you discover them.

Article by Hazel Chua
Gigadgetry: Cool Gadgets, Tech News, Quirky Devices