Paul Jones

According to Sophos' Australian team, which conducted a study to see how likely Facebook users were to offer up personal information, 41 to 46 percent of the 100 people Sophos contacted "blindly accepted" friend requests from two fake Facebook users created by the security firm. After becoming friends with Sophos, the security firm was able to access up to 89 percent of the users' full dates of birth, all of their e-mail addresses, where they went to school, and more. Half of all the users Sophos befriended displayed the town or suburb where they live. They even offered up information on family and friends. Younger users were "more liberal" with their workplace or school information than older users. "Both groups were very liberal with their e-mail addresses and with their birthdays," the security firm wrote in a blog post Sunday announcing the results. "This is worrying because these details make an excellent starting point for scammers and social engineers." - Paul Jones

That was the case this week when the librarians at N.C. State were fed up after the brazen theft of a large $700 clock from their facility. They had security camera footage, but what news organization would have the space to print or air such a story? As it turns out, librarians are pretty clever — they skipped traditional media altogether. They blogged about it and tweeted about it. An army of followers soon retweeted and discussed. Miraculously, the clock soon found its way back. - Paul Jones