Hundreds of Twitter users have been hit by another attack on the popular micro-blogging site, with messages being sent from compromised accounts trying to drive traffic to a pornographic website.

The messages which say

hey! 23/Female. Come chat with me on my webcam thingy here www.chatwebcamfree.com

are being spammed out as Tweets.



However, the index page of that website serves up obfuscated JavaScript that loads a variety of pornographic adverts and contains a web form directed to a site called eroticgateway.com.



Clearly, if a hacker has managed to ascertain your Twitter password there is a chance that they may have also compromised your system in other ways too.

Any Twitter users who find that they have unwittingly posted the message would be wise to change their Twitter password immediately. Furthermore, if you use that password on any other non-Twitter account then you must also change those passwords too (please *don't* make it the same as your new Twitter password.

As we don't yet know how the hackers compromised accounts, it wouldn't do any harm to scan your computer with an up-to-date anti-virus product either.

Twitter has confirmed that approximately 750 accounts were hijacked by criminals during the course of this attack, and says that they have reset the passwords of all compromised accounts. That should stop the tidalwave of spam messages advertising adult webcam websites for now.

But there is still a lack of clarity of how the accounts were compromised in the first place.

Finally, one extra thing to throw into the mix. Last month, Facebook users reported seeing a very similar message.



You don't have to be Albert Einstein to put two and two together, and deduce that these attacks must be related.

We're seeing more and more attacks from spammers, phishers, malware authors, scammers and identity thieves against the users of social networks like Twitter and Facebook. These aren't just proof-of-concept attacks in controlled conditions - they're full-blooded assaults seen in the wild every day, making money out of real people.

Source: Sophos.com

More people visit social networking sites or blogs than use web-based email, according to a new study by Nielsen Online.

The media bean counter claims over two-thirds of the world's population frequent what it calls "member communities," which includes both social network and blogging sites. Member communities make up the fourth most popular category, overtaking email as the world's most common online activity after search, general interest portals, and PC software applications.

Nielsen said that between December 2007 and December 2008, social networking and blogging sites combined reached 66.8 per cent of the world's online population. These sites account for one in every 11 minutes spent online worldwide, according to the firm's research.



In the UK, social sites account for one in every six minutes the average internet user spends online. Nielsen also found that UK users have the highest tendency to visit a social networking site on a mobile handset, trailed by US and French audiences. The number of UK mobile social networkers is up more than three-fold over Nielsen's count last year.

Conspicuously absent from the list of online activities: pornography. As usual, Nielsen doesn't share how it arrives at its numbers, so we're left to guess whether porn is actually less popular than web email, or perhaps folks just don't view porn when being tracked by Nielsen.

Facebook takes the Crown

Facebook is the most popular of the social networking sites globally, dominating the segment in the UK, Italy, Australia, France, Spain and Switzerland.

Facebook's greatest reach is in the UK, with 47 per cent of Britons online using the site, the study claims. Facebook's stake of users is also greater in both Italy (44 per cent) and Australia (38 per cent) than in its native US (33 per cent.)

Interestingly, the fastest growing demographic of Facebook users are those aged 35 to 49 years old (more than 24.1 million users). The site also has almost twice as many visitors between 50 to 64 years old (+13.6 million) compared to those under 18 years old (+7.3 million).

With age, apparently comes a greater attention span. Of the social segment, Nielsen says that Facebook has the highest average time viewing per person than any other site (three hours 10 minutes).

Source: www.nielsen.com

After months of rumors and blogosphere speculation, Twitter Inc. co-founder Biz Stone today confirmed that Facebook Inc. had looked to buy his company last fall.

Stone's confirmation comes after Peter Thiel, an early investor in Facebook and a member of its board of directors, told BusinessWeek magazine of the company's failed attempt to buy to buy Twitter, a microblogging site that has taken social networking and the Internet as a whole by storm.

In an e-mail to Computerworld, Stone said that Facebook is looking to remain independent. "We're big fans of [Facebook CEO] Mark [Zuckerberg] and his team, but we feel very strongly that Twitter is just getting started. We're planning on building a strong, independent Twitter Inc.," he said.

Meanwhile Thiel told BusinessWeek that Facebook is still on the prowl for acquisitions. "We're still focusing on growing as much as possible," Thiel told the magazine.

Thiel declined a request for an interview with Computerworld.

Larry Yu, a spokesman for Facebook, today confirmed Thiel's comments, but declined to provide any details about last fall's negotiations. He also wouldn't say whether the company is still interested in buying the much-hyped Twitter.

Thiel told BusinessWeek that the parties disagreed over price and structure, adding that the deal would have been at least partly based on Facebook stock and there was difficulty in figuring out what the stock is worth.



Caroline Dangson, an analyst at IDC, said there would have to be great debate over Facebook's stock price, since it's a highly popular but private company that hasn't yet shown whether it can generate significant revenue.

"People are just fascinated that companies like Facebook and Twitter have done so much to transform Web 2.0, yet they haven't made the revenue to transform their success," she added. "There's a lot of debate about value in these sites. They're doing so much but not generating the revenue people expect."

Dangson said she's glad that Facebook confirmed the buyout bid, since his confirmation will likely quell some of the Internet speculation about the topic.

She also said there's a lot more to the story. And part of that may be that Facebook is still interested in buying Twitter at some point down the road. She also pointed to speculation that Google Inc. has thrown its hat -- its much more robust financial hat -- into the Twitter ring.

"If Google came along with a lot of cash, that could be a different story," said Dangson. "I think [Facebook] has realized their stock isn't enough bait. It would have to be a cleaner transaction. But I think if they work with Twitter, there's value for both of them."

In an interview with Computerworld last month, Stone did say that he was interested in working more closely with Facebook.

"We really like what they're doing over there," said Stone of Facebook. "Some of the more obvious stuff is to take advantage of Facebook Connect and put that into Twitter. You could be on Twitter and see who on Twitter is also on Facebook, so you could follow people that you're friends with on Facebook. We're working on it now, but I don't actually have a timeline for when it will be launched."

Dangson said she doesn't see Twitter as desperate for a buyout -- from either Facebook or Google. And that, she added, means the company can be fairly choosy about what offers it seriously considers.

Source : computerworld.com