Details of 100m Facebook users collected and published

"Personal details of 100m Facebook users have been collected and published on the net by a security consultant."

More info: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10796584

Interesting. So if I understand this correctly, is this really bad? By their unique ID, they don't mean their password, just their Facebook name?

"Ron Bowles used a piece of code to scan Facebook profiles, collecting data not hidden by the user's privacy settings.

The list, which has been shared as a downloadable file, contains the URL of every searchable Facebook user's profile, their name and unique ID.

Mr Bowles said he published the data to highlight privacy issues, but Facebook said it was already public information.

The file has spread rapidly across the net."

Knowing that the Facebook profiles in question are public, I think it's really bad. Mr Bowles just collected their ID, name and profile, but much more information could easily be collected (infos, pictures...).

But this info is publicly available - assuming the average person's FB settings. Surely?

Kind of like this comment from over at your link Geek:

What happened is that someone wasted hours compiling already available material and then posted it on the 'scary' Pirate Bay website, as if they were disclosing secrets of national security. It's no more alarming than finding the yellow pages in a brothel. If you want to meet friends and share information with the world then stop whining when the person looking over your shoulder can see it all too.

Mark Ford, East Grinstead, UK

This info gives direct access to public profiles, e.g. direct access to users who let every piece of information they updated on their profile searchable.

Isn't this more of a worry? Mobile 'phone nos?

Mobile apps harvesting user data: Black Hat Day One

July 29, 2010 4:27am

by Joseph Menn

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More than a hundred innocuous-looking wallpaper applications for Android handsets have been harvesting users’ phone numbers and SIM card information and sending them off to a Website based in China, researchers said Wednesday at the Black Hat tech security conference in Las Vegas.

The wallpapers–background pictures of ponies, basketball scenes and the like–have been downloaded more than a million times, the researchers said in highlighting growing concern about potential for malicious applications on Android, Apple’s iPhone and other smartphones that are rapidly gaining popularity. Researchers Kevin Mahaffey and John Hering said it was unclear what the data could be used for, but Mikko Hypponen of Finland-based F-Secure said he had found scams in which phones were directed to call expensive toll numbers.

This Techcrunch article explains it better than I do: http://techcrunch.com/2010/07/28/hacker-proves-facebooks-public-data-is-public/

All very interesting, thanks Mr Geek

I would be concerned.

Seems that users are aware about how evil Facebook is: Facebook Flops in ACSI E-Business Report