A Facebook ‘dislike’ button is actually a scam to dupe users into giving up personal information.
By installing the ‘dislike’ button, a rogue application gains access to Facebook users’ accounts and begins posting spam messages, from which the scammers earn money.
The dislike button scam encourages Facebook users to download an application with the message: “Download the official DISLIKE button now.”
Once the application has accessed their Facebook profile, it updates the user’s page with a link and a message: “I just got the dislike button, so now I can dislike all of your dumb posts lol!!!”
The dislike button scam is the latest in a series on Facebook, which have included bogus links with messages including “the biggest and scariest snake”, “OMG, shocking video” and “world’s worst McDonald’s customer.”
Graham Cluley of security firm Sophos told the BBC that many of the Facebook scams appear to be from genuine companies. The dislike button scam points users towards a Firefox add-on that installs a ‘dislike’ button.
“Many people are giving permission for completely unknown apps,” said Cluley.
“Anyone can write a Facebook app – these scams are constantly springing up.”
Dislike.
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