State-sponsored cyber spies want your Facebook status, researchers say

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20120409_3435.php

By Aliya Sternstein
Nextgov
04/09/2012

Facebook frequently takes flack for privacy invasions, but the next 
controversial byproduct of the social network may be cyber espionage, 
according to security researchers.

Status updates on Facebook posted by friends and family of government 
officials or the officials' own unencrypted Facebook activities can be 
used to gather intelligence such as U.S. troop movements, says Rob 
Rachwald, security strategy director for cybersecurity firm Imperva.

While data brokers profit by collating social communications for 
advertisers, spies and hackers on government payrolls can profit by 
parsing the same information. And there's a lot of it. In 2011, Max 
Schrems, a Vienna law student interested in the dossier Facebook's 
computers kept on him, filed a request for his social media records 
under European data protection regulations. He claims to have received a 
1,222-page file of deleted messages, removed "friends" and other current 
and former data.

An Imperva report slated for release on Tuesday explains hackers can 
analyze these records, including connections between "friended" business 
partners and colleagues, to map out the hierarchy of different 
organizations. "The organizational structure can be used for corporate 
espionage, foreign-government and even military intelligence," states a 
draft reviewed by Nextgov.

[...]


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