A Large Percentage of Facebook Scam Victims Are Mobile Users

Security researchers from BitDefender have found that a large percentage of users who clicked on a Facebook scam link were using mobile platforms.

The analyzed scam was similar to the many others that can be spotted on Facebook at any given time for over half a year now.

It started with an enticing message that tricked users to click on a link. In this case the message read "CLICK HERE to see the status update that got a girl expelled from school!"

The spammed link was a goo.gl shortened URL and led users to a rogue app that asked for access to post from their walls and to complete one of several surveys.

Fortunately, Google offers statistics for goo.gl short URL and the BitDefender researchers were able to determine the scam's impact.

The link registered a total of 28.672 clicks, which is not bad for a scam of this type. However, the most interesting find was that 5,652 of clicks came via m.facebook.com and another 411 via touch.facebook.com, the sites versions for handheld devices.

When checking the platform stats, the suspicions are confirmed - a lot of users clicked on the link while using Facebook on a mobile device.

After Windows, the second most used platform was BlackBerry with 2,453 clicks, followed by iPhone with 1,767. Mobile devices from manufactureres like Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson or LG, were also in the top 10.

In conclusion, such scams have the potential to affect a high number of mobile users, 24% of the total in this case.

"When data security researchers focus on finding malware specifically designed for mobile platforms, they lose sight of an important mobile platform threat source -- the social network," says George Petre, BitDefender Threat Intelligence Team Leader.

"Statistics indicate that malware targeting social networks may be the biggest current threat for mobile devices," he adds.