When users click on the link and give the program permission to access their profile, "it silently updates your Facebook status to promote the link that tricked you in the first place, thus spreading the message virally to your Facebook friends and online contacts," says Graham Cluley, a senior technology consultant at the British security firm Sophos, on his blog. After the installation is complete, a message saying "I just got the dislike button, so now I can dislike all of your dumb posts lol!!!" appears. After gaining access to a users account, the rogue application posts spam messages on the page and ask to complete an online survey.

Facebook posted a warning message on its security blog. "Beware of the fake Facebook 'dislike' button. As always, we advise you not to click on suspicious links on Facebook. We're working hard to stop these from spreading. If you see one, report it to us, and warn any friends who might be affected." However, the warning came too late for many. "I did the click thing...HOW DO I GET RID OF IT???,” asks a Facebook user on the blog.

User that accidentally installed the fake application can click on the "account" button on their home screen. After navigating to "application settings," they can disable the "dislike" program.

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"Millions of people ask their friends questions on Facebook every day," says Facebook on its blog. "Facebook Questions helps you tap into the collective knowledge of the more than 500 million people on Facebook. For example, if you're vacationing in Costa Rica and want to know the best places to surf, you can use Facebook Questions to get answers from nearby surfing enthusiasts. Because questions will also appear to your friends and their friends, you'll receive answers that are more personalized to you."

To widen the social circle and ask a question to the Facebook community, users have to click the "Ask Question" button at the top of their homepage. They can also add a photo or a poll to their question. To find the right target audience, users can tag their question with a specific topic, such as IT or WordPress, for example. The question will then be shown to people who have expressed interest in the particular topic.

"Tagging themes also helps others benefit from the knowledge of everyone on Facebook," the Facebook blog says. "For instance, if you've always wanted to learn more about cooking, politics or even how to train for a marathon, Facebook Questions lets you see what others are asking about those subjects. You can browse answers from people with deep knowledge on a topic or click ‘Follow’ under any question to receive a notification each time someone submits a new answer."

However, all questions and answers posted will be public and visible to everybody on the Internet.

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"Last month, we announced a number of changes to make privacy simpler and to give you more control over the information you share with other people. Today, we're taking the next step by providing more transparency and control over the information you share with third-party applications and websites with a new, simpler application authorization process," said Bret Taylor, Facebook’s Chief Technology Officer, in a blog post. "With this new authorization process, when you log into an application with your Facebook account, the application will only be able to access the public parts of your profile by default. To access the private sections of your profile, the application has to explicitly ask for your permission."

Facebook announced the changes in 2009 following mounting international criticism, especially from the Canadian Privacy Commissioner. Until now, 350 million Facebook users that wanted to open an application did receive a message saying that the application may "pull your profile information, photos, your friends' info, and other content that it requires to work."

"Today, Facebook announced positive steps to ensure that platform applications will begin adhering to a new standard of transparency: before users connect to an application, they will interact with a dialog box that details exactly what pieces of personal information the user will have to share in order to use the app," said the Center for Democracy & Technology in a statement. "...once Facebook fully implements the announced changes, users who install new applications will be told exactly what information these applications are requesting, whether it is their political interests and work history, friends' photo albums and current city, or all of the above. By giving users granular and easy-to-understand notice of an application's data collection practices, Facebook will be empowering them to make more informed decisions around sharing their data."

The social networking site has grown rapidly since its launch in 2004 and has grown to almost 500 million users. Privacy issues have plagued the site for years, and frequent changes have annoyed users.

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While only a small percentage of Pakistan's population of 170 million has Internet access, social networking sites have grown in popularity. It is estimated that 25 million Pakistani, most of them young, use the Internet regularly. Blocking access to YouTube and Facebook will result in a 25 percent decrease of Internet traffic, the Hindustan Times reports.

The current crackdown on the free flow of information is not the first. Two years ago, PTA blocked YouTube and demanded the removal of content it deemed offensive. Facebook and YouTube will remain blocked until the end of May, but many news reports speculate that the newly instated censorship will continue indefinitely.

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"Right now, iPhones have user accounts like Gmail, MobileMe, Yahoo!, and more featured. In the near future, it seems like Apple is going to try to add Facebook to that list," Apollo writes in the Gunning for Safety blog. "… it seems strange to put Facebook on a list of email providers at first, but when you think about it, the iPhone can use Facebook's contacts, profile pictures, events, messaging framework, and so much more. In fact, that is exactly what Apple seems to be playing around …"

While no official confirmation was available from Apple and Facebook, the move could be the first step to integrate social networking into the iPhone.

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