FB virus attack leaves firms with official links worried

Mumbai, Nov 21: The virus attack that took at least 2 lakh Facebook users to porn websites last week left many brands and companies with their official page on the social networking site worried.

The companies who have their official pages on Facebook feel threatened that a similar attack on them could bring down their reputation leading them to take a step towards securing their Facebook pages.

“There are 60 million regular Internet users and 38 million of them are on Facebook. For brands and companies, social media websites are something they can look to for publicity and good name," said Yashraj Vakil, COO, Red Digital, a social media specialist which handles the social media activities for Monginis, Mumbai Indians, Adidas and others.

A group of hackers had attacked the social networking site few weeks ago on the grounds that Facebook leaked details of its users to American Intelligence Agency, CIA.

The link that was circulated by the group of hackers landed a user to a porn or violent website infecting more than two lakh profiles.

"Since we manage certain companies" pages, we have received requests from some of our clients to beef up their security level. The first and foremost step is to ban fans from pasting any link or images on the companies" official pages. It is not activated on all but the official pages of certain companies dealing with the education sector," said Vakil.

He further said that it was impossible to keep a eye on number of users joining fan clubs everyday as the number of users was high.

However, restrictions like these would lead to no communication between the fans and the brand, which is an important feature of the social media.

“That can"t be helped, at least for a certain period. The brand name has to be kept secured from getting maligned," said a representative of a sports brand who have their official page on Facebook.

OneIndia News