Facebook revealed dates of birth of users, even if they are 'hidden' says Sophos

Sophos discovers flaw which could lead to identity theft. Even if you had told Facebook to make your date of birth secret, it could still be viewed because of a security hole.

Experts at SophosLabs say that Facebook appears to have now fixed the security hole (15 July 2008). Learn more at http://www.sophos.com/security/blog/2008/07/1578.html

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• facebook
• sophos
• date
• of
• birth
• identity
• theft
• sophoslabs
• data
• breach
• vulnerability
• fraud
• id
• birthday

[csmillie]

This has already been fixed, it was a bug in the beta of the New Profile design...

[SophosLabs]

Hi Csmillie. Yes, we told Facebook about the problem on Monday 14 July, and it was fixed by the 15th. We intentionally kept quiet about the breach until after it was fixed, as we didn't want to publicise a flaw that identity thieves could use to their advantage.

[22cheray]

WHY DA HELL DID U PLACE UR BIRTHDAY THERE IF U DID WANT ANYONE TO SEE IT

[crazy456eyes]

crazy. I have a fake date of birth and fake dead email address

[Tokyorosebiz]

Please check out My Place by Tokyo Rose an amusing rock music video warning of the dangers of too much social networking. Although it is amusing it does carry a very dark message of what may happen.

[24theallison]

omg if you dont want people to know anything about you then dont join facebook, twitter, myspace etc. you putting you info on the internet where hackers can get you personal info. there is not use of complaining about.

[ryanlee604]

i use FB but i dont add ppl i dont know. never use the auto log in and don't let anyone use ur account. u dont want to be blamed for something that u did not do

[blackfrancis55]

even with security settings, it is never a good idea to enter your real birthdate or other info anywhere on the net. just enter something wrong or ridiculous. make yourself a member of the pixies for example.

[iscrewy]

i always just put something close ost my birth date XD just put in 1980

[TerryOlinger]

Facebook has no integrity. It is loaded iwth tricks. Be careful. Or just don't join. Or attempt to deactivate your account. Good luck on this one. They don't like this....

[skatequeen01]

lol yeah but you can always delete your facebook account and make a new one with less or no private info, or you can just make up shit lol

[adrastea99]

None of my info is on the web.

AND A FEW CRAPCKERS STILL FOUND ME???

Nothing is sacred anymore my friend, try to explain that to the parents and kids. I swear to god, my 13yo cousin put ALL of her personal info on facebook, i freaked out when i found out but she made me swear not to tell her parents.

Recipe for disaster, no?