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Facebook's stock may be getting another boost soon, thanks to Nasdaq.

The social-networking company is set to replace Infosys on the Nasdaq 100, the collection of the largest 100 nonfinancial companies trading on the stock exchange. The company will be added to the index on December 12, according to CNBC, roughly seven months after its difficult IPO.

In addition to being an apparent nod toward the company's growing influence in the tech community, the move is also expected to lead to a stock price uptick as index fund managers snap up the stock to ensure that their fund … Read more

It may seem odd to talk about user growth for Facebook, which with 1 billion-plus members is already more than three times the size of the entire U.S. population. But much of what the company does boils down to just that: How to add the next billion users? And then the billion after that?

And that's why today's announcement that Facebook is revamping its mobile messenger app is such a big deal. If it works -- and that's still a big if -- Facebook may be able to reel in many of the holdouts who so … Read more

We all live with the consequences of our finest ideas.

Or the ones that seemed the finest at the time.

I am confident that when the fine minds at Square Enix created Hire Hitman they had a sense that it would prove popular with men who are boys and boys who think they are men.

After all, this little Facebook app -- launched to promote the no doubt very fine and possibly religious computer game Hitman: Absolution -- allowed you to peg a friend as the target of a virtual hit by the computer game's protagonist, Agent 47, and share a video of the friend's termination, which incorporated a photo of the friend from his or her profile. … Read more

When given the opportunity to question those who lead Facebook's privacy team about proposed changes to the social network's data use policy before voting on the matter, Facebook users were more concerned with how the site currently manages its data.

Questions during today's half hour live Web talk (archived here) included ones about how posts on Timeline are displayed, what information is shared with advertisers, online bullying, what happens if your account is hacked and, of course, what about that viral copyright post. (It's fake.) One user wasn't even sure there was a vote: "… Read more

Twitter users who post tweets to their feeds via SMS could be vulnerable to a security flaw, according to a security consultant.

Jonathan Rudenberg yesterday posted to his blog an SMS vulnerability he discovered in Twitter that allows anyone who has knowledge of someone's mobile number to post tweets to that person's feed.

In order for the vulnerability to be exploited, victims must have SMS tweeting authorized on their accounts. From there, the would-be poster needs only to spoof their actual mobile number through an SMS gateway -- something Rudenberg says can be done very easily -- and … Read more

People use Facebook in very different ways. Most Facebook users update their status only a couple times a month or not at all, according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center Internet & American Life Project. In fact, one in six Facebook users has never posted a status update.

On the other hand, women on Facebook average 21 updates per month, and men six updates each month, according to the survey, which was published last May.

As many Facebook users quickly learn, the social network is not without its risks. This is especially true for people whose Facebook … Read more

A data-privacy advocacy group known as Europe v. Facebook says it plans to take the Irish authorities to court to put teeth into data protection in Europe.

The privacy group, which is based in Austria, has been campaigning for more privacy and greater data protection for the 1-billion-plus members of the social network. It has thus far won some concessions, such as Facebook switching off its facial recognition feature for European users.

But the group says the concessions made by Facebook do not go far enough. To push for greater protections, it wants to take the Irish government to court … Read more

PARIS -- Facebook revamped its Facebook Messenger service today in an attempt to get people to dump mobile-phone text messaging in favor of something more sophisticated.

Facebook Messenger today is essentially an instant-messaging network, complete with separate apps to use the service. But with the new incarnation, people need only a phone number, and no Facebook account, said Peter Deng, Facebook's director of communications product management, at the LeWeb show here.

The service is available initially in South Africa, India, Australia, Argentina, and Venezuela, he said, and in India's case in partnership with a carrier. Many young people … Read more