I've noticed recently that there seems to be an upswing in the number of people that take those so-called "quizzes" on Facebook. I'm not going to be derisive of anyone who takes those quizzes (I've even taken them on occasion). But I did want to comment on why you should be extremely careful when you click that link to take one of those quizzes.
It all goes back to our "friend" in the IT security world, social engineering. Getting you to click on a link is a form on social engineering, called phishing (no, English professors, its a real world in IT security circles). Phishing occurs when a individual or organization tries to get personal information out of you some way over the Internet. One such way is through email, another through web sites that pique your interest. The best known of these scams is the Nigerian email scam (you know, the one where you get an email from someone who says you won Country X's lottery, a relative you've never heard of died and left you a BIG inheritance, etc. You just have to provide personal information to get it transferred to your bank account).
Most of the time phishing is sent like spam; you aren't specifically targeted. But if the attempt is more narrowly focused it is known as spear phishing. And if the target is very well-known or well-off (like the CEO of a company or a big-time politician) then you have a case of whaling. Phone scams that attempt to get personal information is called vishing. Boy, these IT security guys come up with some wonderful names for this stuff, don't they.
So what does that have to do with you answering quiz answers on Facebook? Well now, every time you click on one of those links that takes you to an external quiz, you are passing on information to the site to which you are trying to connect. That usually includes information about you, your location via your IP address (even if you are attached to a Facebook server that information is stored on that server somewhere), etc.
It's even worse when you click on one of those quizzes that asks you to link your Facebook account to the site. Now you've even provided the site with ALL the information that is currently stored on your Facebook profile, including your Friends lists, any contact information you have in your account, and even personal information such as your birthday, your home location, etc. You've just opened yourself up to them.
So now the quiz site has access to all the information on your Facebook profile and page. What can they do with it? The least you'll have to worry about is spam. The worst is that you could lose you digital identity. Now they can use the information for impersonation purposes to get additional personal information on you, such as impersonating a government official, bank officer, etc. They may not have your birthday or social security number yet, but it doesn't take much for them to impersonate someone who can get that information.
Many of those places can also contain all sorts of malware. Once you link to the site you have opened up your computer to all sorts of threats from viruses, worms, Trojans, etc. Now you have even more headaches to worry about.
So what can you do? Well, first thing would be to make sure you don't do any of those quizzes that pop up again especially those quizzes that ask you for access to your Facebook profile or ask to post to you Facebook profile. I know you want everyone to know you are the modern Dumbledore, Captain Kirk, or have the soul of a arctic wolf because an unscientific quiz told you that you were. But is it really worth your digital identity to do that?
The next thing I would do is make sure your antivirus and firewall software is up-to-date. You want your software to catch any new little "visitors" into your computer system. If at all possible, you want to make sure you have a clean and up-to-date copy of your antivirus on a removable hard drive and USB drive that you can run every so often. Your antivirus and firewall can be infected just like any other program on your computer. The external antivirus will be slower than when it is installed on your computer, but it can still detect and address any problems that might appear and that your the antivirus you have installed on the computer missed.
I'm not saying stop trying out quizzes. Just be careful when you do one of the quizzes knowing that you could be opening your digital identity to all sorts of trouble.
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