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Facebook, the world's largest social playground, is partnering with Websense to protect its netizens from malicious links. Starting soon, when you click on a URL posted to Facebook, it will be checked for a number of red flags. If none are found, you'll proceed to the destination just as you always have. But if it appears suspicious for any reason, a security alert will warn you that "This link may not be safe!"
This all takes place in the cloud, or more specifically, the "Websense ThreatSeeker Cloud." Websense describes this as "an advanced classification and malware identification platform." What this engine does is analyze the URL, its real-time aspects, and the site's reputation. Based on what it finds, a site is either deemed safe or potentially unsafe. Facebook users will have the option to ignore the pop-up warning and proceed anyway if they feel it's a false positive.
"Facebook is a big target for criminals online," Spencer Parker of Websense told the U.K.'s Telegraph. "We'll be protecting all 750 million of its users."
According to Parker, this integration of Websense into Facebook won't have any effect on privacy. He says his company will not receive any personal information about Facebook users, the technology is just there to weed out potentially malicious links.
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