Tagged - a social networking site to stay away from

[Kat]

Here is a copy of an email I received warning Meetup organizers about a social networking site called Tagged. I've never been to the site so luckily I haven't run across this issue myself. Apparently when you go to the site and give them your email, they try to get your password too so it can send out emails to everyone on your contact list inviting them to join, and so on and so on. This is a major invasion of privacy and much like viruses (remember Melissa?) that invade your email. I don't mind if a site asks you to refer a friend, but this is a total invasion of privacy. Stay away from Tagged. Far away.

There is some legitimate concerns about "Tagged" going on in some of the local Meetup circles.

I decided to research this to find out what is going on.

What I found that "Tagged" might actually be a legitimate site with over 30 million users, BUT they are using scrupulous tactics in building up their database. Apparently, the way they set up their sign up process, they dupe people into entering in their local email account password by giving them no apparent alternatives (but there is).

If you give them your email account password, it will send out invites to your entire address book. This in of itself is not necessarily a bad thing, but if you want to be part of these sites, be careful as to choosing whether you want them to have access to your address book or not, because these type of tactics are meant to spread sites like "Tagged" very quickly. Who knows what they would do with your address book information and your password in the future. (In fact, you may even want to consider changing your password if you signed up for this site and used a familiar password that you use on your financial sites..)

Here is some of what I found on the web about it. (Note: Symantec makes Norton Antivirus..)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tagged.com

http://www.symantec.com/enterprise/securit...ets_web_20.html

http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/Harvesting-Teenagers/

http://www.authenticationworld.com/blog/20...ids_and_ph.html

If anyone has any other useful information about this and other networking sites, add those to the Message Board thread.

You may want to pass this information to your members.

Thanks again,

Remember, phishing and identity theft are real problems so use caution online and don't give your passwords to places like social networking sites. I just looked at our social bookmarking button, and thankfully, it does not include this site. Treat your passwords as if they were your social security number and read terms of service if any site asks you for information that makes you uncomfortable.

Kat

[Chris Grieb]

Kat; Thanks for the warning. Having just paid money to fix my computer warning like yours are appreciated.