Site most vulnerable; Hacking software easily available on Web

If you thought your profile on Orkut showcased your best, think again. Hackers have made this popular social networking website their favourite haunt as four girls in Gujarat found out recently. The girls, from a reputed engineering institute in Gujarat, were shocked to see their nude pictures posted on their Orkut profiles. Realising that their profiles had been hacked, the girls approached the Ahmedabad police. They lodged a complaint against the pornographic material on their profiles and stated that a "hacker" was meddling with their friends' list too. The hacker was using abusive language on their profiles.

Similarly, when an MNC employee quit her job and joined another company, her former boss, who had a crush on her, created a fake profile of her new boss and started abusing her on it.

These are not isolated cases. According to cyber security experts, Orkut, one of India's largest used social networking sites, is one of the most vulnerable ones and thousands of Indian users are becoming victims of "smart hacking."

Spoofing

The most common mode of hacking is spoofing of a person's profile as most users make their personal information public on social networking sites. Through spoofing, the hacker can create an exact copy of your profile which can also be called a "virtual you."

Rajat Khare of Appin Securities said, "Even if you have locked your Orkut pictures, videos and scraps, one can easily access your account and can even copy your pictures. A hacking software called Orkut Hack is easily available on the Web through which a hacker can unlock all your locked profiles."

Scrap away

The other way of hacking an Orkut account is by sending scraps. Most hackers post malicious links that look genuine or have attractive titles like "breaking news," "new games" or "nude pictures." As you click on the link, you get logged off. As you log in, the malicious link automatically sends your username and password to the hacker. This can be also done by creating a popular social community. 

"Mostly hackers create a link of a famous game and as the user clicks on it, his or her computer gets infected. Many hackers also create a fake profile and start chatting. While chatting, they take down all your personal information and then create an identical profile to send scraps to your friends," explained Khare.

Cyber security expert Sunny Vaghela said, "Cases of crime on Orkut are very high. I get at least three to four cases of fraud on Orkut every day. Though Orkut has tightened its security system, loopholes still exist."