Look at the news today. Look at the war in Syria. Look at the violence between Israel and Palestine. Look at tensions in Asia, and mass shootings in the United States. The world is becoming a dangerous place.
Is this why Facebook warns of state attacks, attacks sponsored by foreign governments? Last Friday, October 16, Facebook’s Chief Security Officer Alex Stamos put a notice out. The notice said if they believe your page was targeted by a government hacker, they will pop-up a message urging you to secure your account. One thing you’ll be instructed to do is turn on ‘Login Approvals’. This prevents others from logging in your account. For mobile Facebook users, Login Approvals will send a security code to your phone. Only those who enter the code, aka the smartphone’s owner, can login. Stamos didn’t mention a credible threat, but noticed state sponsored and government hacks are more dangerous than other hacks. So if you see a message of this severity, chances are a lot more than your Facebook account was hit. Chances are your whole computer was hit by malware or some other dangerous virus. Facebook advises that if you see this pop-up message on your system, you should either rebuild or replace your whole entire system.
I appreciate Facebook warning us of such a serious threat. I even appreciate them telling us how venerable we are to international government hackers. But why are they telling about this now? I’m especially inquisitive when I read that Chinese cyber attacks are happening to US companies, and these hacks have been intensifying for weeks. Is this a coincidence? And I notice Facebook didn’t say which specific nationalities or states. This may sound crazy, but could they have included even US entities like the NSA? Are we to be that concerned with the foreign enemy? Or are our enemies right beside us?