Those ‘fun’ FB quizzes may not be as harmless as you think

Admit it—at one point, you’ve scrolled down your Facebook timeline, saw a post from one of your friends proudly sharing “which milk tea flavor are you?”. And while the flavor of milktea that that the test will supposedly reveal is completely unrelated and will not significantly affect your life in any way (maybe provide a few moments of entertainment, but that’s about it); you still feel that unexplainable yet uncontrollable urge to click and take the test yourself.

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But whether it tells you that you are wintermelon milk tea, 100% sugar or no sugar, no ice, no pearl milk tea (true story), the results are a lot less fun than you’d expect. And yet, most of us still choose to willingly click on those links like they’re some cosmic fortuneteller revealing the secrets of our innermost selves (pro tip: who you are is definitely not what some random online quiz says you are)

In fact, Kaspersky’s Global Privacy Report in 2018 revealed that online users in the Asia Pacific appear to be willing to share their private information in exchange for various personal gains from social media.

A whopping 39.2% said they are willing to sacrifice their private data if they can get additional safety like security checks or surveillance. Of that percentage, 22% confessed they share their social media details to find out the results of fun quizzes while 18.9% admitted they will disregard their privacy if they’ll get something for free, such as a software, service or gift. 

The report also disclosed that more than half (55.5%) of survey respondents in Asia Pacific from the age groups 16-24 and 25-34 think it’s impossible to have complete online privacy in the modern digital world. Following this sentiment, the respondents also say they are willing to sacrifice their personal data for short term gains and ‘likes’ from social media.

Furthermore, 53.6% of the surveyed reported that they have already experienced having their private or secret data accessed by someone who did not have consent. The online privacy breaches were highest for 16-24 year olds at 57.1%. The respondents said because of the leakage, they felt disturbed by spams and adverts, felt stressed, and thought they embarrassed/offended someone. 

What we often fail to realize (or remember) is that social media is chock full of your personal and private data like addresses, birthdays, and photographs with the intent to easily find and connect friends and families within the platform. It might have been created for a good thing, but now, these platforms have been reported to be spying on its users and have become breeding grounds for attacks.

Think about it like this, would you readily hand out your full name, birthday, and contact details to some random person on the street claiming to tell you what animal you were in your past life? Probably not. In fact, you’d most likely think they were either crazy or trying to rob you or both.

While the report shows that online users are now wising up to the threats in the online world with 56.7% opting to protect their devices for passwords, the carelessness of some when it comes to social media sharing can be a “downward spiral with often disastrous long-term consequences.”

“So, as we have made peace with the fact that we can never guarantee our digital security, many of us are choosing to sell-out when it comes to securing the integrity of our data and persona online—but with big potential costs. In fact, many people are unwittingly making themselves an open target,” the report said. 

“Our report clearly showed that data security awareness across the region is indeed rising as we speak. Unfortunately, complacency is still prevalent and so is data misuse. We continue to advocate for keeping good digital hygiene. It’s one of the basic ways we can stop our confidential data from falling into the wrong hands,” said Yeo Siang Tiong, general manager for Southeast Asia at Kaspersky.

Here are some tips to keep your personal information safe:

• Think twice before posting on social media channels. Consider the wider consequences of making your views or information public. Could content be used against you or to your detriment now or in the future?
• Keep passwords of your online accounts only to yourself. It might seem like a good idea or a convenient way of sharing accounts with family and friends, but it’s still likely that these passwords will be get into the hands of fraudsters. Safeguard your private information to protect you, should relationships turn sour.
• Take your online privacy seriously. Share or permit access to your information with third parties only when absolutely necessary, to minimize exposure of it falling into the wrong hands.
• A combined solution of security products and practical steps can minimize the threats and keep your data safe online. Reliable security solutions for comprehensive protection from a wide range of threats—such as Kaspersky Security Cloud and Kaspersky Internet Security, coupled with the use of Kaspersky Password Manager to safely store your valuable digital data – can help solve the problem of keeping your personal information under control.