Top 10 Methods used By Hackers to Hack Facebook Accounts

Facebook has become an essential part of our daily life. We share our life moments, photos, videos and text msgs on Facebook. But, when it comes to your privacy and security, you can never be sure on the internet. Facebook and similar websites try their best to ensure the user’s privacy and security but there are still many issues that can cause the hacking of Facebook accounts.

So let’s not ignore this and try to understand how a hacker can hack the Facebook accounts and let’s understand how to safeguard Facebook accounts against hackers.

Top 10 Methods used By Hackers For Hacking Facebook Accounts

1. KeyLogging

Keylogging is one of the easiest ways to hack a Facebook account. A keylogger is a program that records and monitors the user’s input and keeps a log of all keys that are entered. The keylogger can actively send your inputs to hackers via the Internet. You have to be very careful while dealing with keyloggers because even the computer experts become victims of keylogging.

How to detect Keyloggers?

• Scan your USB drives before using them
• Download software from trusted sites only
• Use a good antivirus

2. Phishing

Phishing is very easy and considered as n00b technique but it is one of the most effective techniques of Hacking a Facebook account. There is 50-50 chance for a hacker to get victims password using Phishing if your victim is not aware of basic internet terminologies. There are various ways of carrying out a phishing attack. The most common one is where a hacker creates a replica of a login page which looks like the real Facebook page. The victim will then think it’s the usual login

The most common Phishing to create a duplicate of a login page which looks like the real Facebook page. The victim thinks it’s the usual Facebook login page so he enters his login details in phishing page. Once the victim is logged in through the fake page, the email address and password are stored in a text file or in hacker’s database.

How to detect Phishing Page?

• Check URL of the login page.
• Never login your Facebook account on other devices.
• Use Modern web browsers that identify the phishing page.
• Avoid emails or text msgs that ask you to log into your Facebook account.

3. Session hijacking

When you log in to your Facebook account, your browser and the facebook’s server maintains a session for user authentication. The session details are saved in your browser’s cookie files. In session hijacking, the hacker steals those cookies and then access the victim’s account. Session hijacking is most common when accessing Facebook on an HTTP (non-secure) connection and it is widely used on LAN and Wi-Fi connections.

How to avoid Session Hijacking

• Do not use Facebook when connected to shared Wi-Fi or LAN.
• Try to clear cookies every 2-3 days or if possible daily

4. Saved passwords

Most of the time we share our login and credit card details in the web browser. Anyone can see your Facebook account from your browser’s password manager. A hacker can get physical access to your computer and insert a USB programmed to automatically extract or retrieve saved passwords in the Internet browser or any other information the hacker may need.

How to avoid Password Hacking?

• Try not to save passwords in web browsers
• Do not share your device with people
• Block the device connectors

5. Sidejacking with Firesheep

Firesheep is a tool that used to carry out sidejacking attacks. It only works if the victim is connected to the same Wi-Fi. It is similar to session hijacking but it only works in Wi-Fi networks.

How to avoid Sidejacking

• Do not use Facebook when connected to a public Wi-Fi network.

6. DNS spoofing

If a hacker is on the same network which is connected to the Victim, he can change the original page and replace it with his own fake page and easily gain access to the victims Facebook account.

How to Avoid DNS Spoofing?

• Always configure it to be secure against cache poisoning
• Manage your DNS servers securely

7. Man in the middle attacks

In this method, the hacker secretly relays and possibly alters the communication between the server and victim who believe they are directly communicating with each other.

The hacker makes independent connections with the victims and relays messages between them to make them believe they are talking directly to each other over a private connection, when in fact the entire conversation is controlled by the hacker.

The Hacker must be able to intercept all relevant messages passing between the two victims and inject new ones. This is straightforward in many circumstances; for example, an attacker within reception range of wireless access point can insert himself as a man-in-the-middle.

How to avoid MIME attacks?

• Use VPN services
• Use a proxy server to access the internet
• Use good antivirus with good firewall options

8. Social engineering

Social engineering is a simple method that’s based on collecting as much info from the victims as possible. The information may include the date of birth, phone number, security questions etc. Once a hacker gains access to this info, he can brute force the info or use recovery methods to get login passwords.

How to avoid Social Engineering

• Never share personal info via email or phone
• Avoid links from unknown or suspicious sites

9. Botnets

Basically, botnets are networks made of remote-controlled computers or bots. These bots have been infected with malware that allows them to be remotely controlled. It’s expensive to set up botnets and this makes them be minimally used in cases of hacking Facebook accounts. Some very popular botnets include spy eye and Zeus.

How to avoid Botnets 

• Keep all your software up to date
• Ensure that your firewall is always on

10. Email ID hacking

With this method, the hacker only needs to access the connected email id of any account and then reset the Facebook password manually.

How to avoid email ID hacking

• Enable 2 step authentification in your Gmail account
• Use strong passwords
• Avoid entering email on scrupulous sites