These days, with Facebook and Twitter and social media galore, it can be increasingly hard to tell who your ‘friends’ are.

But after this, Internet users would be well advised to ask another question entirely: Are my ‘friends’ even real people?

In the continuing saga of data security firm HBGary, a new caveat has come to light: not only did they plot to help destroy secrets outlet WikiLeaks and discredit progressive bloggers, they also crafted detailed proposals for software that manages online ‘personas,’ allowing a single human to assume the identities of as many fake people as they’d like.

The revelation was among those contained in the company’s emails, which were dumped onto bittorrent networks after hackers with cyber protest group ‘Anonymous’ broke into their systems.

In another document unearthed by ‘Anonymous,’ one of HBGary’s employees also mentioned gaming geolocation services to make it appear as though selected fake persons were at actual events.

‘There are a variety of social media tricks we can use to add a level of realness to all fictitious personas,’ it said.

Government involvement

Eerie as that may be, more perplexing, however, is a federal contract from the 6th Contracting Squadron at MacDill Air Force Base, located south of Tampa, Florida, that […]