Attack Of The Orkut Clones (And How To Remove Them)

(Image Credit: Collectoybles)

Story: So you are surfing Orkut one day and your friend contacts you and asks why you are scraping disgusting remarks about their girlfriend. You laugh at the your friends accusation, saying you would never do that until he points you to a profile that has your image on it.

Worse, it has your contact info, as well as a list of all your friends. It's a fake profile. So now, what do you do?

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Many people have been scraping, commenting (on older posts) or emailing questions on how to remove a fake profile. Although some may consider this trivial, it has resulted in some embarrassing situations for certain people, and believe it or not I've heard of worse examples bordering on criminal.

So for those of you who are harassed by these fake profiles, here are some recommended steps that you can take to successfully remove these profiles from Orkut, as well as suggestions of what NOT to do when you discover one.

1. Flag the profile: This is the first step that you need to do (and if you skip this, you may end up making the process longer). Underneath every profile (and community) there is a report abuse button where you can notify Google of the offense.
   
   
   
   Select the impersonating someone else or is a fake person option...
   
   
   
   ...and in the text field below provide a detailed description of why this profile is fake, along with links to your real profile and the fake one for Google to compare.



2. Alert your friends: Contact your friends online (via email not scrapbook) and ask them to do the same above.
   
   The email method would be advisable over scrapbook because it doesn't alert Mr. Fake Profile on what is happening and it keeps your friends scrapbook from being flooded with unnecessary outrage.
   
   Note: For those of you who are Firefox fans, Orkut Helper makes this process so much easier as all you have to do is right click and select "report as bogus" on the profile link.
   
   
   



3. Alert the Orkut Public: believe it or not, there are certain forums whose sole purpose is to alert each other about fake profiles so they can (as a group) remove them from Google's system. See this post for details.



4. Contact the Authorities: Only do this if the fake profile created is posting your personal info online (i.e. phone numbers, email, address) and random people are requesting disgusting services (you know what I mean by this).
   
   American users will probably receive a faster response (being that Orkut is hosted here locally) than those in other nations such as Brazil or India. Either way, don't go off into "Google hating," as they often have to balance user privacy against justice issues.
   
   Note: If you are a lady, I would recommend contacting the authorities if the profile is harassing you in any way, as these losers should know better.



5. Relax and wait: Don't let this one profile ruin your experience online. After you (and various individuals) have reported this, simply go on surfing Orkut, and enjoying life in Google's deep blue forum.
   
   Also give Google at least two weeks to remove the profile, as they are supporting close to 50 million users on Orkut alone, let alone the hundreds of millions (if not billions) who use their other services daily.
   
   Note: if after two weeks you do not receive a response, you can contact Orkut directly over here or alert Google at security [at] google [dot] com .

Now that you know the steps you have to take to successfully remove a profile, here are several things you SHOULD NOT do:

• Hack the account: This will not only get you banned from Orkut, but also from most of Google's services.
  
  Worse, your fake profile would still remain, spreading even more havoc online.



• Threaten the user: Although it may feel great to vent how you feel towards Mr. Fake profile, this could also not only get you banned, but also arrested as well (which would make the situation worse).
  
  Note: Ironically in similar situations I've seen some people get banned from Orkut because of this (which helps out your enemy more than it helps out you).



• Spam their scrapbook: It's not only a waste of time, but also a quick way to earn Google's wrath.


• Yell at Google: I would only recommend this if you want to slow down the response time for Google to solve your problem.
  
  Simply alert Google to your problem, and do not spell in all caps (it's considered yelling) and check your grammar and spelling.

That's it thus far, and hopefully these steps will help aid your fight against these impostors. I am interested to hear on other ways people have combated these Orkut clones, and if you have any advice or stories to share, then let the rest of us know by posting below.

Mass Scrap Your Friends?

(Hat Tip: Tech Buzz)

For those of you who have been emailing, scraping, Gtalking, commenting or Skyping me to death about this, there is a new program out there that allows user to send mass scraps to all of their friends on Orkut.

Created by Orkutrix and folks from the Orkut Underground community (the same one Google keeps trying to delete) this GreaseMonkey hack can be a powerful tool in the hands of both friend and foe (think spammer).

Some of my friends have already started to use this, although I give it a couple weeks until Google shuts it down completely as this tool can easily be abused.

You can visit Tech Buzz for instructions on how to download this hack, as well as how to use it.

Note: Perhaps it's a good thing I installed this previous hack. ;-)

Beware Of Fake Orkut Site

Rahul of Welcome to the Devils Workshop is warning users of a new fake Orkut site that has sprung up online.

The site goes by the address of Orkuft .com (note: intentionally separated, DO NOT visit address while logged into your Google account) whose purpose seems to be stealing users accounts.

A quick Whois.net search reveals that this hacker may reside in Switzerland although the tech address registers from the US.

I'm in the process of forwarding this to Google, and if you have accidentally clicked on the account from either a scrapbook or forum, contact Orkut immediately and change your Google account password ASAP!

If anyone else comes across any other phishing sites, please let all of us know by either posting it on a weblog or commenting here.

Attack Of The Fake Clones (On Orkut)

Don over on TechNiche reports on an incident where someone tried to create an exact replica of his profile.

Someone had created a fake profile of mine in ORKUT! The fake profile was an exact clone of my profile! and the only difference was the number of friends!

He/She, whoever it is, was very clever and had already started adding all the people on my friends list!

I did not come to know this till some of my friends started asking me why another profile when i already had one! They thought it was me who created the profile and thought it was one of those pranks which i casually did!

I was taken for shock when i saw the fake profile, luckily he/she had not abused anyone using it, else there was a chance that i would have been mistaken by my friends.

Don reported the incident to Google, and within a day they removed the fake profile from Orkut (is it me, or has customer service recently improved on Orkut?).

Because I was curious myself, I decided to search for fake profiles, and low-and-behold I discovered one! Ironically, there was nothing in the profile (no pictures, no friends, and no communities listed) so I think Google should have an easy time figuring out the real me from the fake.

Note: If you ever run into a similar incident, you can always report fake profiles to these communities as they enjoy exterminating these types of accounts.

Is Google Winning The Scrapbook Spam War?

When it comes to fighting spam, Google has done an excellent job within Gmail, Blogger and even Google Groups.

But when it comes to Orkut, it seems that spammers have found a new way around the word verification system. This probably explains why I keep getting various scraps attempting to improve my "love life" through various forms of physical touch. (I think these spammers need to get a day job)

I discovered this after talking to one of the members of the Orkut Underground (whose forum keeps getting deleted by Google) who showed me a simple GreaseMonkey script that allows a user to post a link and bypass the word verification process altogether (note: for obvious reasons I will not post that script here).

Over in the What should Orkut do? forum, Randi has a great suggestion on what Google could do to combat this.

scrapbook should have 3 options.

1 open to everyone
2 open to friends only
3 open for those who speaks same language as you

and you can choose what's best for you

Google is already working on this suggestion, as it is within the top five feature requests, although it wouldn't hurt to submit that request again.

India Censors Orkut...But Users Have A "Key"

This is really a sad day for India. A step back for the worlds largest democracy.

I have been following the story of whether or not India would censor Orkut, and it appears that India has taken a baby step away from freedom of expression.

Abdul Qabiz confirms this on his weblog:

I am not able to access orkut.com, it seems it has been banned in Maharastra (the state I stay) or entire India? [...]

I can understand the government's concern about different hate-communities on orkut but I am wondering, why can't Indian government give a list (URLs) of such communities to ISPs so that selective ban can be done instead of entire orkut.com.

Since I am not a legal expert (especially regarding Indian affairs) I would have no clue how the nation of a billion people could go about and resolve this via courts.

However, just because the door to Orkut is locked, it does not mean that there is not a key.

Users may be able to access Orkut via proxy sites, such as Math Tunnel (hat tip: Orkut Guide) until this problem is resolved. There are other resources being developed by users as I type, and if anyone knows (or is creating) access points elsewhere, post a few of them here (and spread the word to your friends inside Orkut via email).

Note: It's days like these that I wish an Indian ACLU existed.

Update: Users in Maharastra seem to be able to still access Orkut. It looks like the ban was in discussion, but not actually used (Thanks Rahul D, DK/SarDaar, Ajay D'Souza, and Vivek for the heads up on this).

Orkut Underground, And Why Google Keeps Deleting It

(Hat Tip: My Nick Iz Sick)

For those of you who do not know, Orkut Underground (now at version 4.0) is a forum where users can learn many hacks, tips, and tricks on how to make their Orkut experience even better.

Unfortunately, the forum keeps getting removed by Google, which means users have to start all over again recollecting tips and tricks from around Orkut (as well as the web).

I think one of the reasons Google removes this forum is that it keeps giving out ways for users to flood each other scrap books and communities, which generally counts as spamming in Google's book.

Orkut Underground is a great place to collect useful Orkut tips, but they may want to filter out these hacks (as rejoining this forum after it gets deleted can get old after a while).

Thou Shalt Not Steal?

I've been receiving reports of forums being stolen and/or hijacked throughout Orkut, which although not surprising is a bit alarming.

I will not highlight any cases here (as I'm not Judge Judy after all) but if your forum has been taken over, you need to contact Google and let them know (visit their Safety and Security Center for details).

And remember, the whole world contacts Google about items ranging from the very dumb to the very serious. Give them some time to respond back to you (at least a week or two).

Arrested For Fake Orkut Profile?

It was not for creating the profile, but rather what was on the profile itself.

Save yourself n save others has a photo from the Mumbai Mirror, although a search on their site does not pull up the story.

However, a quick Google search was able to reveal the full story online.

(Moneycontrol India) Youth misuses classmate's profile, posts lewd scraps

He is caught following the girl's complaint

A Bachelor of Management Studies (BMS) student of Thane was arrested on Thursday for creating a classmate's profile and uploading her picture with offensive messages on an online community site without her permission.

The cyber cell of the Thane police got into the act following a complaint by a girl that someone had created her profile on Orkut.com with her picture and posted lewd messages. Within 48 hours the culprit was nabbed.

The police seemed to have a difficult time locating the culprit as the Orkut server was located in Sweden (really?) Thanks to Yahoo!, they were able to track down the culprit's yahoo address and via IP locate his exact location within India.

Moral of the story: Don't harass girls on Orkut, and don't use Yahoo! if you do (although Google may report you as well).

Update: Fixed some grammer issues.

Suing Google Because Of Fake Profiles?

Apparently some people have no sense of humor.

(SportsNetwork.net) Barrichello, who isn't a member of the Orkut community, took exception to the false profiles on the site, as well as the improper use of his name and image. Thanks to a decision by the civil court in Sao Paulo, Google will now have to take off all the profiles listed.

Orkut now have seven days to comply, or face fines of £270 a day. Rubens has already won an action against the company, back in July of this year, but it has not been fulfilled. As such, Barrichello's lawyers have also asked for an additional £210,000 in damages for pain and suffering.

Pain and suffering from fake profiles? Probably more like gain and sacking funds from a company with deep pockets.

Orkut already discourages fake profiles of celebrities and you can always report them as bogus (or at least report it to these forums).

There are many fake profiles on Orkut, and simply calling a lawyer because your feelings were hurt is probably a great way to waste judicial time and setback online media as well (not to mention making yourself appear immature).

Orkut Inbox Messages Not Private?

I noticed recently that Google has recently changed the Orkut email interface. Unfortunately their seems to be a minor problem, with the fact that your Orkut email may be visible to outsiders, that is if they know the exact link).

Vijay, over on Matrix Chronicle details this on his blog, and provides a link for users to test this out.

This does not make me happy, and Vijay communicates the same feeling over on his weblog.

When I clicked the link, it opened an orkut login box. I expected that I will be able to see the message only if I logged in with the userid of the person to which this message was meant for. But I was wrong, it showed the message even though I logged in with my user id! This means that every information pertaining to a message can be accessed using the URL to the specific message. This is not SO private because URL alone should not disclose the content of a message. It should be accessible only to the person which the message is meant for, after password authentication.

I am going to notify Google about this, but in the mean time, I would recommend users to have their email sent directly to them instead of their Orkut account.

For those of you either new to Orkut (or lack the geek powers like us Orkut freaks) these three simple steps should help you resolve the privacy issue, that is until Google can make time to resolve this issue.

1. Locate and click on the Settings link near the top of the page.
   
   



2. Uncheck all of the messages boxes and check all of the email boxes.
   
   


3. Scroll down and click on the update button, and then you are done.
   
   

This should resolve some of the privacy concerns, although if you send email from your Orkut account, it may be visible to users. As stated previously, I am going to notify Google about this error, and encourage users to do the same.

Keeping Orkut Clean (Sweeping The Mess)

Thanks to everyone who has joined the campaign to keep Orkut clean and for alerting users about forums, profiles, etc. that encourage child predators in their sick behavior as well as those who enjoy promoting violence throughout the forums.

Orkut is Google's most undervalued feature that has (in my honest opinion) the potential to bring in millions of dollars for the company--and I am not talking about via Ad Sense here (I'll cover this in a later post).

Unfortunately Orkut's biggest threat are those using it for "less desirable purposes" and this could threaten not only Google, but the millions who use it for legitimate purposes.

Without further delay, here is a partial list of some content that Google will frown upon. (Note: Titles with an "*" have been partially translated into English.)

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Warning: Some of these forums contain graphic images and are NOT suitable for the viewing public (let alone the sane).
___________________________________________

On the child predator front:

• Exchange of photos, lolitas and teen * (Report as bogus)


• Gayzinhos de 10-18 anos (Report as bogus)


• MSN & WebCam Gay TeeN - BRASIL (Report as bogus)


• Who wants to eat the Dannyzinha * (Report as bogus)


• I WOULD ABSORB THE MIRIM_13ANOS * (Report as bogus)


• There are several other questionable profiles, albums and forums which you can find over here.

On the terrorism front:

• Terrorists deep of yard * (Report as bogus)


• Followers of Osama Bin Laden * (Report as bogus)


• Rede Alkaida Brasil (Report as bogus)


• Al Hamas (Report as bogus)


• Although other forums were mentioned, the ones above advocate violence against others, something Google may want to check out.

There are several other communities also dedicated towards keeping Orkut clean, and I will see if we can all network together to make Orkut a fun place to surf in.

Google already has a system in place to deal with this content, so I would recommend that WE USE IT before contacting the American authorities. Let's keep Orkut clean together...and make Google millions. (=

Note: Above image created by Web 2.0.

Did Saudi Arabia Ban Orkut?

Yet another nation has apparently to bar access to Google's Orkut to its citizens as it appears that the forums hosted more than just women without burqa's. Although this was over a month ago, Xo Ail brings us the sad news.

Yes, Orkut is banned in Saudi Arabia. KSA (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) has banned the Orkut Network realizing that it cant attain the possibility of producing or easing pornographic material online.

Saudi Arabia is a country where 99% of the porn sites or sites with absurd content are banned. Its stronger than china, where no proxy surfing or anything of the kinda would work.

Apparently some users have already found ways around the blocks. That's good news to hear, otherwise they would have had to settle for MuslimSpace.com, as Sharia law is enforced there.

Orkut Word Verification Down?

Update: It's working again. Thanks Google!

Apparently Google's word verification for Orkut is not working today. If you are posting to a forum / scrapbook, you may see this screen:



The text says:

To protect our users' safety and privacy, we now require users to pass a word verification when posting content with a link.

enter the text as it is shown in the box below:

The picture keeps erroring out in Firefox and IE. Is anyone else receiving this as well?

Brazil May Close Google Office Because Of Orkut

The government of Brazil is really getting upset at Google. Orkut, a social networking service created by Google (and "the MySpace" of the region) is attracting various bad elements within the forums, and Google is apparently being uncooperative with Brazilian authorities.

(People's Daily Online) Brazil's Federal Prosecution Service on Monday announced that it would move to close the operation of U.S.-based web group Google in the country.

According to the public entity, Google has not followed court orders, determining the company to cooperate with the investigation on crimes concerning its social-networking service Orkut since June. Google has denied the charges.

Orkut has become a favorite among Brazilians, especially youngsters. However, the Federal Court believes that there are communities and personal profiles on Orkut, who exchange information on drugs and even traffic them.

It is no secret that drug dealers are using Orkut to solicit, communicate and traffic illegal drugs as their are certain forums dedicated towards this type of activity.

Previously the Brazilian government was upset about child predators using the Orkut service, although Google seems to have cooperated somewhat with the authorities in that arena.

Google's main concern seems to be user privacy, although their actions are being perceived by Brazil's government as protecting those who violate their countries laws.

Fake Orkut Site Stealing Google Passwords?

(Note: Published on The Social Networking Weblog)

(Hat Tip: IT Digest, Software And Tools, Digital Inspiration)

Users logging onto Orkut need to beware, as there seems to be a new phishing scheme aimed at stealing Google passwords to your account.

The carbon copy which goes by ork0t.com (with a zero replacing the "u") seems to be owned by a mysterious person from New Jersey according to whois.net. I did a reverse phone number lookup of this person, but apparently they have listed little info about their true identity.

Users who have Google Toolbar (with Firefox) installed should receive this warning below, notifying them of this copycat.



Users who accidentally log into this site should notify Google as well as change your password to all Google services. (Note: Compromised accounts should not affect users Ad Sense publisher accounts if one does not hold a Gmail account with Google).

Update: I've notified Google about this already, so hopefully their legal department can take care of this issue.

Orkut Greater Than Blogger?

It might as well be. I've been experiencing "blogger woes" for several days and what use to take three seconds to log into blogger now takes ten minutes! Oh well, I am using free software...and blogger has been experiencing many problems lately.

Ironically, Orkut's servers have been relatively smooth, with no donut errors in site. Could it be that the Google teams have switched places in regards to performance?

Orkut Disabling Hyperlinked Text?

(Note: Now that Blogger is working, I can finally post.)

Update: Published on The Social Networking Weblog.

Apparently the boys and girls at Orkut have decided to disable users from posting hyper linked text. Users attempting to hyperlink text (example: [link=http://www.orkut.com]orkut[/link]) will come to a quick surprise when they publish their scrap or forum post.



If a person uses the code above, it will simply put the link next to the word they were attempting to hyperlink, which basically makes the post very ugly. Ironically, the above code is mentioned in the Orkut formatting tip window, even though it no longer works.



This not only affects future posts, but it seems to have affected the ones in the past as well. Google may have done this to combat link spam, (a never ending problem for the Orkut team) although revealing the full URL of links does make the forums look a bit tacky.

Orkut Rumors That Just Won't Die

I hate to mention this, but apparently the rumor that Orkut will delete your profile lives on, despite the fact that this has been debunked by the Orkut Team via Orkut News.

(2/16/2006) We heard there's a rumor going around orkut that says orkut.com will delete your account for inactivity. We've even received this notice from someone pretending to be Orkut himself! This is not true and you can safely disregard these messages or scraps.

Unfortunately people are extremely gullible or did not receive the memo that this is a hoax.

Although I love all most of my friends on Orkut, if you could please stop forwarding me this message, I would love you even more. Thanks.

Brazilian Pedophiles Using Google's Orkut?

(Hat Tip: Search Engine Herald, Google Operating System, Search Engine Watch)

After taking a break and focusing on other weblogs, I came across this in my Feed Reader on the Bloomberg News:

Google Inc., the owner of Brazil's most-used online community site, may face a criminal probe for distribution of child pornography and racist materials by its users, lawyers for the attorney general said. [...]

The service, Orkut, is being used to violate Brazilian law, said prosecutors Sergio Suiama and Karen Kahn.

"Orkut has become a paradise for pedophiles, who solicit sex with childen and distribute pornographic material," Kahn said at a news conference in Sao Paulo.

From what I am reading, Google is hesitant about complying with international laws where it has no "physical presence" (in other words, servers within a nation's borders).

Although I understand their fear of being controlled by foreign governments who lack jurisdiction in the US, it would be wise for Google to comply with the Brazilian government.

Child exploitation is a global issue, and if Google is seen as hampering efforts to catch these low life's, then you will see a backlash not only in cyberspace but also in the market (as they will be labeled as a "public evil").