Malware Authors Exploit Facebook App

February 23, 2009
By Richard Adhikari:

            Is a bogus application making the rounds on Facebook just a failed marketing ploy? Or something more dangerous?

Is it marketing or is it malware? 

That's the question facing Facebook users who are confronting the threat of a second targeted attack less than two weeks after last being hit by a virus. 
Users and security experts are now wondering whether an official-looking message making the rounds through the social networking site is a new way for malware authors to reach Facebook users, or a bizarre case of hackers taking advantage of an ill-conceived marketing stunt. 
The alarm centers on an official-looking notification, titled "Error Check System" or "Error Checking System" that warns users -- falsely -- that friends have had problems viewing their profile. It also urges recipients to click on an "Activate" button in the message to correct the errors, which thereby downloads a Facebook app and asks users to select friends whose profiles they would also like checked.Doing so sends the notification to those friends, yet there doesn't seem to be any malware built into the message. That's led some observers to wonder whether the "Error Checking" application is some poorly executed attempt at promoting a new product or service....read more on...->http://www.internetnews.com/webcontent/article.php/3806151/Malware+Authors+Exploit+Facebook+App.htm