Staying safe around account hacks
You or someone you know may have been a victim of account hacking viruses. I am going to show you how to spot it and fix it.
I am going to use facebook as an example because a friends facebook account has recently been hacked but this example can apply to just about any account like msn, twitter, even your bank account.
How It Happens
On a recent attack on my friends facebook account, one of his friends account has been hacked. This hacked account sent mass messages to his/her friends on facebook with a link to go see a video, and posted on his/her wall the same link. This link took my friend to a fake youtube page, a page that looks like youtube but is at a different web address, and then a pop-up opened saying that you needed to download software to see this video. My friend installed this software but later found out that it took over his facebook, this virus did the same thing as his friend, sent messages and links. But there is a deeper function, most of the time that is just to spread the virus around the web, the real function of the virus could be to steal information of destroy data on your computer.
Preventing Infection
Well now that you know what happens its pretty simple to see how to prevent any infection. I would say not to click on any link but that would contradict the point to sharing websites like facebook. Just be aware of the link address and the content, if the website looks like youtube but doesn’t have the http://www.youtube.com in the address bar then don’t click on it. If a website wants you to download software to view a video or photo don’t allow it to. Get away from that website as soon as you can, and tell your friend that their account may have been hacked then give them a link to this post so they can fix it.
Fixing The Problems
Well if you have been infected then you will need to fix it. Don’t create a new account and delete the old one because that wont fix anything, that will just delete everything you have and the virus can take over your new account. The first step is to scan your computer for viruses. avast! antivirus home edition is a good, free antivirus program that I personally have been using with no problems ever. After the virus has been removed from the computer all you need to do is change your password. To make a secure password you can use a password generator but that uses makes a password of random letters and numbers and it can be hard to remember. An easy way to make a secure password that you can remember is to make sure it is at least 8 characters long and contains at least one upper case letter one lower case and one number. For extra security you could add a symbol too. After all of this, make sure that you contact your friends not to click on the links and to tell them to read this if they have.
