Before IPO, Facebook Takes the Fight Against Clickjacking to the Courts
Facebook is turning to the courts to fight the “clickjacking” scourge which sometimes plagues the social networking site. The news comes as rumors are circulating that Facebook’s initial public offering (IPO) could be happening as early as this week, with a possible offering of up to $10 billion in shares.
If you’ve ever clicked on a Facebook link only to have that same link get instantly (and seemingly magically) sent out to your entire network of friends without your approval, you have been clickjacked.
Facebook’s finally saying “enough is enough.” It’s accusing Washington-based marketing company Ascend Media of the unwanted spam-causing practice in a lawsuit announced Thursday.
“Security is an arms race,” said Facebook general counsel Ted Ullyot said in a post on the site. “And that’s why Facebook is committed to constantly improving our consumer safeguards while pursuing and supporting civil and criminal consequences for bad actors.”
The Attorney General of Washington state filed a separate lawsuit, also accusing Ascend Media of clickjacking.
“We don’t ‘like’ schemes that illegally trick Facebook users into giving up personal information or paying for unwanted subscription services through spam,” said Washington State Attorney General Rob McKenna with a nod to one of Facebook’s most well-known features. “We applaud Facebook for devoting significant technical and legal resources to finding and stopping scams as soon as possible, and often before they even start. We’re proud to join forces in order to protect Washington consumers.”
In a clickjacking, users are presented with some kind of enticing material, such as a too-good-to-be-true promotion. The clickjackers add code to these links that hide the “like” button in the link itself. Once a user clicks the clickjacking link, it’s too late — the material’s already been “liked” and shared to the user’s entire social network.
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