Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

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Growing Number of Mobile Device Infections Traced Back to Social Media

venerdì, aprile 27th, 2012

Growing Number of Mobile Device Infections Traced Back to Social Media 300x268 Growing Number of Mobile Device Infections Traced Back to Social MediaOn Friday, the internet and mobile security experts at AVG Technologies released its Q1 2012 Community Powered Threat Report.

The report raises awareness about the use of mobile devices in connecting with social networks and how this is fast becoming a preferred method for cyber criminals to spread malware – primarily to Android-powered devices.

“We detected a big increase in the use of social networks such as Facebook and Twitter to target Android users. Cyber criminals are finding it very convenient to distribute their malware straight to a mobile device via these networks,” says Yuval Ben-Itzhak, Chief Technology Officer at AVG. “The growth of the Android platform has been phenomenal, which has not gone unnoticed with cyber criminals who have discovered it to be a lucrative target for their malware. In 2011, Google had to remove over 100 malicious apps from the official Android market, Google Play.”

With Facebook likely to see its user base reach 1 billion this year, AVG says that criminals who target Facebook translates to targeting around 14 percent of world’s population or approximately 43 per cent of global internet users.

Consider also that there are over 300 million Android phones already activated, with over 850,000 Android phones and tablets added to that number each day, and it is clear these two trends combined result in a new threat: infecting Android devices using social networks.

As the Q1 2012 Community Powered Threat Report shows:

  • On Facebook, all it takes for a cyber criminal to attack is to set up a fake profile which downloads malware to a device and randomly invite Facebook users.
  • On Twitter, a cyber criminal creates a spam profile and then posts tweets containing shortened hyperlinks to malware using trending hashtags. The way in which Twitter works makes sure the tweet appears on the top of many people’s Twitter feed.

To learn more, check out AVG’s official website here.

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This week in social media: Twitter sues spammers, Facebook subpoenas are revealed, and more

domenica, aprile 8th, 2012
Social Media Twitter YouTube Flickr Facebook 520x245 This week in social media: Twitter sues spammers, Facebook subpoenas are revealed, and more

It’s that time of week again when we take a look at the latest social media news, and highlight some of the biggest and most interesting stories.

While Instagram has been everywhere all week long, there’s a few other headlines that caught our attention, including one which reveals what subpoenaed Facebook files look like.

Instagram, Instagram, and a little more Instagram

It’s certainly been Instagram’s week in more way than one. With the long-awaited launch of Instagram for Android, we can all breathe a collective sigh of relief that the question, “When is Instagram coming to Android?” will never, ever, be asked again.

The launch has been met with as much fervour as would have been expected, following the many months of speculation, rumours and expectations.  The Android version of the app hit 1 million downloads in under 24 hours, and has received well over 130,000 five star ratings on Google Play.

Instagram shared a little bit of insight into how they handled the sudden influx of users. The post begins:

“The last few weeks (on the infrastructure side) have been all about capacity planning and preparation to get everything in place, but on launch day itself the challenge is to find problems quickly, get to the bottom of them, and roll out fixes ASAP.”

The post goes on to share all of the tools and techniques used to ensure that Instagram was on its toes, and ready to face any issues that arose.

We took a close look at the Android app, and of course there was the inevitable comparison with its iPhone counterpart.

Screenshot 2012 04 03 09 07 19 This week in social media: Twitter sues spammers, Facebook subpoenas are revealed, and morePhoto Apr 03 9 07 27 AM This week in social media: Twitter sues spammers, Facebook subpoenas are revealed, and more

The Next Web’s own Matthew Panzarino wrote:

Fragmentation rears its head once again with Instagram on Android, forcing the company to leave out features it could have otherwise shipped in order to support the wide array of OS versions and hardware out there. I know people like to pretend this isn’t a problem, but it is.

Aside from that, Instagram for Android is a great example of an iOS development house making a good translation of its app that manages to be similar on both platforms, while retaining a singular theme between them. If you’re an Android user that has been waiting, this is a faithful and mostly whole Instagram experience, enjoy.

Since its release, the Android app has seen a few updates, the latest of which allows users to install it on SD Cards, tablets and WiFi only handsets.

The release has been met with its fair share of criticism, the worst of which was seen from a group of iPhone users, who may even be going so far as to look for iPhone-only alternatives.

Alongside the Android release, All Things D reported some additional news on the investment and valuation front:

It looks like Instagram is close to wrapping up a Series B round led by Sequoia Capital, according to several sources close to the situation.

The maker of the fast-growing photo-sharing app, which just made its way to Android, is set to receive $50 million at a $500 million valuation, the sources said. Others joining the round could include DST Global.

Visits to Google+ grew 27% in March

We’ve all heard the reports explaining why Google+ is DOA, citing comScore figures that put average time spent on the site at just 3 minutes.

The most recent statistics from Experian Hitwise may hint otherwise. While Google has been reluctant to share figures about time spent on the social network, it has been more than happy to announce its growing userbase, reaching 90 million in January, and adding another 10 million, having recently reached the 100 million mark. According to Larry Page, that also happens to be 100 million active users.

So how is the social network doing with traffic? According to the latest numbers reported by Mashable, total visits to Google+ grew by 27%, reaching 61 million in March.

The graph below shows the steady growth that traffic on Google+ has enjoyed since its June 2011 launch.

googleplus traffic This week in social media: Twitter sues spammers, Facebook subpoenas are revealed, and more

Twitter finally goes after spammers

Mention a brand or product on Twitter and you’re bound to find yourself being spammed. Finally, Twitter is doing something about it – but it’s not what you might expect. In addition to beginning a fight with spammers on the Twitter front, it’s also attacking them on the legal front.

Twitter has decided to take 5 companies in particular to court, for encouraging and facilitating spam on the Twitter platform. The announcement read:

This morning, we filed suit in federal court in San Francisco against five of the most aggressive tool providers and spammers. With this suit, we’re going straight to the source. By shutting down tool providers, we will prevent other spammers from having these services at their disposal. Further, we hope the suit acts as a deterrent to other spammers, demonstrating the strength of our commitment to keep them off Twitter.

In addition to the lawsuit, Twitter is also launching an anti-spam measure, and is using its t.co URL shortener to analyze link traffic, to get a better idea of what kind of content it leads to.

So who are the five companies Twitter is taking to court? The Next Web’s Jon Russell introduced us to the companies earlier this week:

The lawsuit names three firms — TweetAttacks, TweetAdder and TweetBuddy – and individuals from two other organisations — James Lucero (justinlover.info) and Garland Harris (troption.com) — each of whom is charged with violating Twitter’s usage terms by selling software that encourages firms to spam the service .

He goes on to explain:

These services violate Twitter’s regulations by allowing users to spam other users with ease. You could set each system so that every time a user tweets about ‘the Superbowl’, your account follows them and sends them back a message about a company…Toyota, for example.

TweetBuddy and TweetAttacks have already been taken offline since the lawsuit was announced.

This is what Facebook hands over when subpoenaed by the police

It’s no secret that if Facebook is subpoenaed by the police, it has no choice but to hand over the data, but what does that data actually look like? The Boston Phoenix reveals just that.

As the site points out, Facebook has done everything in its power not to let its users know what kind of information is ending up in the authorities hands.

The Boston Police Department released case files relating to the murder of Julissa Brisman, a masseuse from New York City. After his arrest for the murder, Phillip Markoff committed suicide while in jail awaiting trail. Among the files were printouts from Markoff’s Facebook profile.

Carly Carioli of The Boston Phoenix writes:

“While the police were evidently comfortable releasing Markoff’s unredacted Facebook subpoena, we weren’t. Markoff may be dead, but the very-much-alive friends in his friend list were not subpoenaed, and yet their full names and Facebook ID’s were part of the document. So we took the additional step of redacting as much identifying information as we could…”

The redacted print outs have been uploaded to Scribd:

The black and white printouts are a far cry from what you’d expect from a Facebook page, but contains all of Markoff’s activity, wall posts made by his friends, photos he was tagged in, and his complete friends list.

Pinterest is the third most popular social network

It wouldn’t be a social media roundup without some mention of Pinterest these days, now would it? Venture Beat reports that Pinterest is now the third most popular social network, preceded only by Facebook and Twitter.

According to data from Experian Hitwise, it’s not surprising to find that Facebook receives the most monthly traffic in the US, with over 700 million visits, while Twitter trails a distant second, with 182 million.

Venture Beat was able to obtain more detailed figures, showing what it means exactly that Pinterest has snagged the third spot, ahead of LinkedIn and Google+. Pinterest’s achievement comes with over 104 million visits in March. Another interesting fact is that Tagged beat Google+ out, by over 1 million visits, for the number 5 spot.

experian This week in social media: Twitter sues spammers, Facebook subpoenas are revealed, and morePinterest’s figures don’t really come as much of a surprise. The site has seen explosive growth over the past few months, making it into the top 30 most visited sites in the US. Between Pinterest’s traffic, and a survey revealing that 21% of Pinterest users purchased items they saw on the social network, marketeers would do well to get their brands onto the site.

We’ve got a few tips and tricks for brands on how to use on Pinterest, and don’t forget to check out Pinerly, an analytics app for the social network, giving you a little bit more insight into how your pins are doing.

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Pair wasn’t the first “social network for couples”, remember Cupple, Duet, and Between?

mercoledì, marzo 28th, 2012
250593884 4b41ceb30f z 520x245 Pair wasnt the first social network for couples, remember Cupple, Duet, and Between?

There’s been a lot of buzz the past few days about a service called Pair, which lets you interact with your significant other in an intimate way. Think of it as a “Facebook for lovers”, a “Path for couples”, or “Super-SMS”. In just its first few days, the app has seen over a million messages sent using the platform.

However, as it usually goes in technology, the first to execute on an idea isn’t the one that generates the most buzz or sees the most success. The rise of Pair is a perfect example of that, as we’ve seen quite a few apps that are “social network for couples”, but didn’t catch on like Pair has.

Facebook wasn’t the first “social network” and Google wasn’t the first “search engine”. Some of the success of those two companies can be attributed to being at the right place at the right time, along with quite a bit of hard work of course.

The idea of sharing things intimately with people, rather than with the whole world, has only just caught on, and Path’s latest success has a lot to do with it. Version 2 of the app was released at the end of last November and took a few months to gain traction. During that time, we heard about a few apps that wanted to focus on just you and that special someone.

The Others

IMG 25521 520x780 220x330 Pair wasnt the first social network for couples, remember Cupple, Duet, and Between?In early November last year, I wrote about an app called Cupple, which I said would be absolutely perfect for long distance relationships. At that time, its CEO Tim Allison told me this during our interview:

Cupple allows the two people in a relationship to have fun sharing photos and building a feed of memories and there is no concern over how that might be viewed by their wider social network. Email and SMS certainly have their place but they have become very functional and often just blur into the daily routine. Cupple is a richer, more connected sharing experience. And of course, completely mobile.

Sound familiar?

In December of last year, we wrote a post called “4 startups prove that technology can bring couples closer together“, which featured Kahnoodle, Duet, Tokii, and Between. Those apps all had similar features with the same premise; share things with only the person that you love.

None of these apps ever picked up much steam when it comes to getting mentioned in technology press. In addition, none of my non-geek friends used them either. When I mentioned Cupple to my fiancee, she said “why don’t we just use Facebook or texts?”.

Right Place, Right Time

When I told her about Pair yesterday when I came back from Y Combinator Demo Day, she said “Didn’t you already tell me about this app?”. So the idea isn’t new, the features have some differences, but perhaps Pair has the benefit of some “extras” that these companies didn’t have.

First and foremost, being a part of a program like Y Combinator definitely helps entrepreneurs get attention from technology press. Also, Pair was able to watch what others were doing and hone in on a few special features like “Thumbkiss” that would make it stand out. Pair has gotten so much interest that Path’s founder Dave Morin decided to invest.

All of this is a perfect storm that could make Pair stand out from the rest. For everyone else, instead of being frustrated that they didn’t get the same attention, they should be glad that there is now a “space” for their idea, which will allow them to innovate, execute, and perhaps get some funding of their own. Perhaps with all of this new found attention on “social networking for couples”, some of our non-geek friends will start trying some of these apps out for themselves and tell us which ones they like the best. Until then, Pair is the darling.

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Fans would rather engage with brands on Facebook than Twitter, says study

mercoledì, marzo 14th, 2012
hearts 520x245 Fans would rather engage with brands on Facebook than Twitter, says study

When we spoke to Jan Rezab, the founder of social media analytics company Socialbakers, one of the main topics he discussed was how the site is able to deliver data on engagement rates on social networking sites.

At the time, we wrote:

Rezab says a key element of Socialbakers is its engagement ratings. Instead of defining success by simple measurements of popularity like follower counts, Socialbakers tries to measure engagement with companies’ social media pages. This provides a more useful picture of how well a company’s social media marketing strategy is working, because “what is important is the quality of the fans and how they engage with your page.”

Socialbakers has just shared some interesting data that gives insight into which brands are successfully engaging users on Facebook, and which are finding more luck on Twitter.

Over all, it’s not surprising to find that Facebook is a far more suitable tool to use when trying to engage fans.

Socialbakers takes a look at some of the top brands on Facebook – Coca Cola, Starbucks, Red Bull, Oreo, Converse, PlayStation, Skittles, iTunes, Pringles and McDonald’s – and compares its presence on the social network to its presence on Twitter, over the past month.

In the post, Socialbakers explains the difference between the relationship that brands cultivate on Facebook and Twitter:

“Facebook engages people in a conversation and a dialogue providing its fans with a feeling of exclusivity. They can access all the brand’s interesting content in pictures, albums, links, status updates and more. This network is great for companies that mainly want to build a relationship with their Fans and share emotions that they want their brand to convey.”

In contrast, Twitter has more limitations:

Twitter on the other hand is limited by 140 characters but at the same time its content reaches more people (Facebook has some content dedicated only to Fans who click on the Like button)and can be posted more often. It´s great for brands that have the need for live streaming, blogging and promoting ideas.

Studying the top 10 brands, six of them are able to better engage their fans on Facebook, two are more successful on Twitter, and the remaining two enjoy similar results on both social networks.

Facebook vs Twitter Fans would rather engage with brands on Facebook than Twitter, says study

Starbucks, Redbull, Converse, Playstation, iTunes and McDonald’s enjoy a higher average engagement rate on Facebook rather than Twitter.

On the other hand, Oreo and Skittles enjoy a higher average engagement rate on Twitter. As explained in the post, the reason behind this comes down to specific social media campaigns.

In the case of Oreo for example:

Oreo cookies are celebrating their 100th Bithday and they are asking their fans to share their Oreo moments and Oreo rituals on Twitter. They are asking for the same engagement on Facebook but perhaps Twitter is more spontaneous and fun for this kind of communication.

For the remaining two brands, Coca Cola and Pringles, the engagement rates on Facebook and Twitter are identical. However, both brands have relatively low engagement rates to begin with, so it may have more to do with their overall approach, rather than the platforms themselves.

While Facebook does give brands more tools to engage users, it’s worth bearing in mind that Twitter is still in the process of fine tuning its platform. Facebook makes it easy to connect with fans, but Twitter encourages creativity and a little bit of thinking outside of the box.

Looking for a few tips and tricks to use on Facebook? Be sure to check out this list of 5 ways to increase your engagement on Facebook. 

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Yahoo Asks Federal Court to Shut Down Facebook

martedì, marzo 13th, 2012

Yahoo and Facebook to Tangle in Federal Court 300x200 Yahoo Asks Federal Court to Shut Down FacebookThis one almost requires a “Let’s get ready to rumble! from Michael Buffer.

On Tuesday it came to light that Internet search company Yahoo has filed suit against social networking giant Facebook in federal court in San Jose, California.

At one time, Yahoo was interested in purchasing Facebook. But ever since a young Mark Zuckerberg declined the acquisition attempt, the relationship has apparently deteriorated.

The latest evidence is the 19-page suit accusing Facebook of violating of its patents relating to digital advertising, information sharing and privacy.

“Facebook’s entire social network model, which allows users to create profiles for and connect with, among other things, persons and businesses, is based on Yahoo’s patented social networking technology,” Yahoo’s filing reads.

Yahoo says everything from Facebook’s News Feed to its privacy settings are infringing upon Yahoo’s intellectual property.

And this isn’t one of those “friendly” lawsuits you see in Silicon Valley from time to time. Yahoo, in fact, says Facebook’s infringements were “willful and deliberate nature” and wants the court to shut down the entire operation.

“We’re disappointed that Yahoo, a longtime business partner of Facebook and a company that has substantially benefited from its association with Facebook, has decided to resort to litigation,” Facebook said in response to the lawsuit. “Once again, we learned of Yahoo’s decision simultaneously with the media. We will defend ourselves vigorously against these puzzling actions.”

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The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA Protest

mercoledì, gennaio 18th, 2012

Mobile Marketing The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA ProtestOn Wednesday morning at 12:01 a.m., Wikipedia went dark for the first time in history over a high-profile and highly controversial protest against pending legislation in the U.S. Congress that could, if enacted, forever change the Internet as we know it.

“For more than a decade,” the Wikipedia site reads, “we have spent millions of hours building the largest encyclopedia in human history. Right now, the U.S. Congress is considering legislation that could fatally damage the free and open Internet. For 24 hours, to raise awareness, we are blacking out Wikipedia.”

In October 2011, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. On the surface, SOPA was aimed at eliminating the illegal copying and dissemination of movies, music, and other digital content.

But the proposed legislation was quickly accused of over-reaching in its desired authority. As a result, Google, Facebook, Wikipedia, Twitter, and other behemoths of the Web stood united in their opposition to SOPA.

And today, Wikipedia and other large online entities are going dark in protest.

“While I support their goal of reducing copyright infringement (which I don’t believe these acts would accomplish),” says Google co-founder Sergey Brin, “I am shocked that our lawmakers would contemplate such measures that would put us on a par with the most oppressive nations in the world.”

Do you believe the Wikipedia blackout will influence members of Congress to kill SOPA before SOPA, as critics claim, kills the openness of the Internet?

Please weigh in with a thought of comment below.

Mobile Marketing The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA ProtestMobile Marketing The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA Protest

Mobile Marketing The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA ProtestMobile Marketing The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA Protest

Mobile Marketing The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA ProtestMobile Marketing The Wikipedia Blackout Begins in SOPA Protest

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The Facebook phone pops up again – Android-based, HTC-made…codenamed Buffy

lunedì, novembre 21st, 2011
Facebook Social Network Logo 520x245 The Facebook phone pops up again Android based, HTC made...codenamed Buffy

You know the history here, right? Well, if not, here’s a quick run-down — For the past year or so (back to September of 2009, to be precise), there have been rumors floating around about what some have called a “Facebook phone”. The idea is that there would be a device with deep Facebook integration, likely akin to what we actually have with Twitter now on iOS.

Well things have gone quiet for the past few months. The last rumors that we heard were that INQ and HTC were both in the market to build Facebook phones. INQ’s version was based on the same idea that its previous Skype phone had, where the entirety of the phone surrounded Facebook. The HTC devices, which were initially reported in January of this year, were set to launch at Mobile World Congress, what came out of it wasn’t quite what was expected.

htcsalsa3 620x426 520x357 The Facebook phone pops up again Android based, HTC made...codenamed BuffyThe HTC Salsa and ChaCha were not deeply-integrated Facebook phones as the potential fans might have expected. Rather they were HTC phones with a big button for quick access to Facebook. Nothing more, nothing less.

Now, un-pause and we’ll come back to today, where All Things Digital is reporting that Facebook has indeed been building a phone. Codenamed Buffy, it’s said to be a heavily-modified Android device, with support for HTML5 applications. The OEM of choice? HTC.

But don’t expect to have your friends in your pocket too quickly — rumors have it that the phone is still 12 to 18 months away.

Now comes the big question – is it the right move? Facebook has a massive base of mobile users, and it wants to continue to see every move you make being social. When you look at how we’re using our smartphones today, it makes sense that Facebook would want to get its hands wrapped a bit tighter around things, but it could also be limiting its market.

To us, it sounds a lot like something that the teenage set would love to use, but outside of that the possibilities seem incredibly limited.

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