Facebook '10 concerts' meme and other trends could let people steal users' lives, experts warn

Your Facebook wall might seem like fun. But it could destroy your entire life.

A new meme makes clear just how much information you might be unwittingly handing over to people on your page.

The "10 Concerts I’ve Been To, One is a Lie" post – which asks people to give a list of just that – could easily be used as a way of stealing people's information and getting access to their bank accounts and most personal information, experts have cautioned.

Like many such memes, the concert list appears to be asking for information that is mostly fun and doesn't serve much purpose. But anyone looking to engage in "social engineering" or plain hacking might be able to use that information to break into accounts.

The list could reveal a huge amount about the person writing it out, experts told the New York Times. That might range from the specific – "what is the first concert you attended?" is a common security question on bank accounts – to the more general, like the clues about your religion, age and interests that such a list might indicate.

Those same dangers lurk in many such quizzes on Facebook. Some might be more obviously about taking data – like apps and websites that ask a series of questions as part of a quiz – while others might look just like memes.

But they all ask for a range of information that could later be used to steal things from you.

Mark Testoni, a national security and privacy expert who is chief executive of SAP National Security Services, recommended to the New York Times that people exercise "vigilance bordering on a little paranoia" when they are posting online. The ways we interact can show patterns of behaviour, where we might live, and other things, he warned.