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New Facebook scam takes advantage of video calling

Facebook scams and viruses grow by the day, so it's no surprise that scammers are taking advantage of the new video calling feature.
Written by Rachel King, Contributor

Facebook scams and viruses grow by the day, so it's no surprise that scammers are taking advantage of the new video calling feature.

Sophos' Naked Security blog reports that the newest Facebook scam makes Video Chat look like an application called Video Call, as seen in the screenshot below. That, in turn, tricks users to be "easily convinced to approve the application to have more liberal permissions."

However, there are a few more noticeable problems with the permissions request if one actually takes the time to read. After all, why would an app that comes directly from Facebook ask to access your data at any time? Facebook can already do that. It could also be argued that a video calling app shouldn't need to post to your wall and news feed, but Google Hangouts actually does something similar on Google+.

Apparently, the scam isn't terribly detrimental as some other Facebook scams have been. This one sends spams to the user's friends as well as lead the user to surveys that generate referral fees for the scammers.

So next time you see a wall post on Facebook that says "Enable Video Calls," don't click on it. If you want to set up the valid and official version of Video Chat with Skype, check out Facebook's authentic instructions.

[image via Sophos]

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