Beware of Facebook messages.

The reason social media viruses spread so quickly is that they are hard to discern from regular status updates, and they appear to be shared by people you trust. Many times, the virus link piques your interest and you almost can’t help yourself because you can’t believe someone would share that information online. That morbid curiosity is exactly what the hackers are counting on.

One of the most popular viruses contains a link that claims to tell you who has been looking at your Facebook personal timeline. Although you may be interested to see who’s been looking at your timeline, Facebook doesn’t share that information with anyone. There is no app that allows you to see who has looked at your timeline, so you know it’s a fake link.

Another popular trick is to use a link that allows you to watch a video of something “you won’t believe!” or even a supposed video of you doing something funny. If it’s a legitimate video, it will play when you click it. If you’re asked to download anything or allow an app to have access to your account, it’s probably not a legitimate link and you should cancel immediately.