Twitter Name Game Phishing Attack

I like Facebook and Twitter. I think they are both valuable tools that can be useful for both business and personal communications. Admittedly though, much of what goes on is a pure waste of time. On Facebook people regularly partake in small quizzes to determine what country they should live in, or which religion best suits them. They also choose top 5 lists of their first 5 cars, or their 5 favorite sports teams, or their 5 favorite breakfast cereals. I am guilty. It is sort of fun on occasion.

There is a game going around on Twitter that generates your 'porn name' based on some key information supplied by you. Using details like your first pet's name, your mother's maiden name, and the street you grew up on, it generates a corny name that you could use if you chose to pursue a career in the porn industry. It is no coincidence that the details used by the game are also key pieces of information that are relied on by many information security systems.

Many web sites and applications ask users to create security questions to verify their identities in the event that they can't remember their password. Those questions are generally along the same lines as the information asked for by this Twitter game. By playing the game you are divulging potentially useful information that could be used to compromise your accounts or steal your identity.

Aside from this Twitter phishing attack, consider the types of information that you share and just who has access to view that information when you are playing games and posting details on social networking sites. It may be fun to share and compare favorite rock bands or favorite Marvel superheroes, but attackers can also collect information like that from social networking sites. If you have ever used your favorite rock band as a password, or ever answered the question 'what is your favorite rock band' as a security question, then by sharing that information on a public forum such as a social networking site you open yourself up to potential compromise.