Cyber threats in social networking websites (1202.2420v1)

Abstract: A social network is a social structure made up of individuals or organizations called nodes, which are connected by one or more specific types of interdependency, such as friendship, common interest, and exchange of finance, relationships of beliefs, knowledge or prestige. A cyber threat can be both unintentional and intentional, targeted or non targeted, and it can come from a variety of sources, including foreign nations engaged in espionage and information warfare, criminals, hackers, virus writers, disgruntled employees and contractors working within an organization. Social networking sites are not only to communicate or interact with other people globally, but also one effective way for business promotion. In this paper, we investigate and study the cyber threats in social networking websites. We go through the amassing history of online social websites, classify their types and also discuss the cyber threats, suggest the anti-threats strategies and visualize the future trends of such hoppy popular websites.