“Once I have the name and URL of a user, I can view, by default, their picture, friends, information about them, and some other details.”
Ron Bowes | SkullSecurity.org

Remember Ron Bowes?

Ron Bowes is the guy that used code to scan the 500 million Facebook profiles for information not hidden by privacy settings, he collected the personal information of 100 million Facebook users, and yes, Ron Bowes is the guy that posted all that information online.

Seems Facebook (surprise surprise) is having some more privacy problems. There was a bug last week that could be played with by spammers to snatch user names and photographs.

Let’s say someone enters the e-mail address of a Facebook user along with the wrong password, well, Facebook would then return a special “Please re-enter your password” page, which just so happens to include the Facebook photo and the full name of the person associated with the email address.

Thanks to Sharon Gaudin for writing “5 tips to protect yourself on Facebook” on Computerworld.com. Where she makes a great point about what people are, or are not doing to protect themselves.

After all the problems, after Ron Bowes, after this most recent bug, and even after Facebook users have been told what to do to protect themselves, Sharon says that:

“Oddly enough, though, that doesn’t mean that most users have battened down their security hatches or have even rethought the kind of information they routinely post about themselves.” She goes on to say that “in light of the concern about privacy and security — and the fact that users don’t seem to be doing what they should be doing to safeguard their information — Computerworld talked with analysts to come up with five suggestions to protect you and your personal information if you’re one of the half a billion Facebook users sharing pictures, videos and updates about your latest dates or upcoming vacations.”

It’s worth a read, it’s pretty much a safe bet that anything titled “5 Tips To …” is going to be good.