Social media users urged to do more to protect their data

12:38 2nd February 2010

Users of social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter should step up their defences to prevent themselves from having their personal data stolen, an expert has said.

"The dramatic rise in attacks in the last year tells us that social networks and their millions of users have to do more to protect themselves from organised cybercrime," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos.

His comments emerged as a new report by the security firm has revealed that malware and spam attacks against users of social media sites have jumped by 70 per cent in the past year.

In other news, the recent attacks against Google and more than 20 other organisations marked a turning point in cybersecurity because of their targeted and co-ordinated nature, a market expert has warned.

Dave DeWalt, chief executive at security group McAfee, said the cyber attacks represented the most sophisticated threat in years and could easily have been targeted at critical infrastructure.

Written by Paul Davis

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