Facebook quizzes often appeal to our curiosity or ego or seemingly provide entertainment during lulls in social media posts or other routine activities, using algorithms to ascertain who your secret admirers might be or what celebrity most fits your profile.

You take the quiz, which asks that you log on with your Facebook credentials and then “like” the site and share with your friends. They take the quiz, too, and share with their friends, and all the while information from your smartphone is being harvested and sold to third-parties.

Some of the third-parties are spammers and hackers. Some of those spammers and hackers also offer their own invasive quizzes, and if you take those, you are putting your device and your privacy at risk or worse, inviting malware.

Unlike spam that arrives via email, asking you to click on a link, taking these tests IS the link. So you might not be aware of the hazards until it is too late.

Interpersonal Divide in the Age of the Machine contains several chapters on social media, including information on Facebook spammers and hackers and loss of privacy. Here’s an excerpt about Facebook datamining:

The question we now confront in the age of the machine is whether our devices enjoy more autonomy than humans pursuant to terms of service that allow constant datamining and intrusion and to which we have agreed, typically without taking time to read the fine digital print. 

Click the photo above or this link to hear a special report from an NBC affiliate. WFLA’s Lindsey Mastis interviews an expert from the Florida Center for Cyber Security about the hidden dangers of Facebook quizzes.

The Center has its own video on ways to protect yourself in cyberspace. Click the photo below to view it  or paste this into your browser: https://youtu.be/sdpxddDzXfE.

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