fblocalmail is a desktop Java (TM) application developed by ‘Scott Goldie’ that allows you to seamlessly access your Facebook (R) messages from your favorite email client.

With fblocalmail users can use their email client to:

• Retrieve Facebook messages
• Send Facebook messages
• Reply to Facebook messages
• Forward Facebook messages to normal email addresses
• Send and Cc a single message to Facebook friends and normal email addresses

fblocalmail works with the following popular email clients:

• Apple Mail
• Microsoft Outlook
• Mozilla Thunderbird

To learn more about the application contact scott@sjgoldie-consulting.com

Facebook has sought to assert its grip on the mobile internet by announcing a platform for operators that will make it easier for people to access the networking site on their phones. Mobile users will now be able to install a specific Facebook application on their phones which will let them receive newsfeeds, messages, status updates, ‘pokes’ and other features from the site. The social networking site, which now has 8.9 million users in the UK, has partnered with Vodafone to release the service, but it is expected that similar deals with other operators will be announced soon. Facebook already has a mobile website which people can access on their phones, but it often means going first to a web browser and typing in the address. The new offering from Vodafone will mean people can click directly on an icon in the phone menu, called a widget. Operators will also be able to integrate more effectively with Facebook’s site, meaning that users can get more regular updates - like with ‘push e-mail’ - rather than having to always to log in. Vodafone subscribers will be able to access the site as part of a

Facebook once again faces the very real possibility of being attacked by cyber criminals. The U.S. Computer. Emergency Readiness Team posted a bulletin on Monday warning users of critical vulnerabilities contained in control that provides the ability to upload photographs, used by the popular social networking sites.

Specifically, the ActiveX control allows users to upload images using the Internet Explorer Web browser. The feature contains multiple stack buffer overflow vulnerabilities in several properties, which include Action, ExtractExif, and ExtractIptc, and testing has thus far shown that versions up to and including 5.0.30 could be susceptible. The vulnerabilities directly affect users running IE on a Windows platform, which automatically comes equipped with the ActiveX control.

If exploited, the errors contained in the Image Uploader could potentially allow a remote attacker to execute malicious code and completely take over a user’s machine. Attackers could lure Facebook users running IE on their PCs with a Web page or HTML attachment infected with malicious code. A hacker could then turn the user’s computer into a boot or shut down the system completely in a denial of service attack, security experts say. In its review of the year,

MessageLabs noted that websites such as Facebook, Linked-In and Plaxo presented rich pickings for identity thieves looking to gather personal information.

As the same company warned in November, scammers are now researching their targets and attempting to lure them to infected websites that will download invasive code to their personal computers. MessageLabs tracked several attacks on senior executives, including one aimed at 1,000 individuals in the finance sector during November 2007.During the year, MessageLabs identified an average of 1,253 new web sites per day that harbored malware, equating to nearly half a million new malicious sites. It also found that social networking tools were the third most common trigger of its web security filtering rules.

As the MySpace Trojan indicates, malware attacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated. In Finjan’s annual report, chief technology officer Yuval Ben-Itzhak warned of “Trojan 2.0″ attacks that would exploit new web technologies such as social networks, blogs, RSS feeds and so-called “mash-ups”. Hackers are getting paid according to the number of users they infect, so their main motivation is to develop attacks that go undetected for as long as possible. This development has spawned new techniques to evade signature-based and database-reliant security methods, he explained. For example, Finjan recently identified and named a Trojan virus Random JS Toolkit that changes every time it is accessed from an infected website, making it extremely difficult to block. These Trojan 2.0 attacks represent a quantum leap for hackers in terms of technological sophistication, and pose a serious challenge to the IT community

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The ad, which began airing on network television Tuesday evening, features a close-up of the iPhone browsing the Facebook website while a narrator presents a voiceover.

“If you love Facebook so much that you check it every time that you’re at the computer, just think about how great it would be to check it every time you’re nowhere near your computer,” the narrator says. “Right on your phone.”

Meanwhile, a second spot dubbed “Cars,” touts the advantages of having the internet in your pocket when negotiating to purchase a new car and wanting to check out prices on Kelly Blue Book before striking a deal.

“Say you’re out shopping for a car, and the salesman says, ‘this is the best deal in town, guaranteed.’ Sounds good,” the narrator says. “But say you want a second opinion. That’s when having the entire internet on your phone sounds even better.”

The two new ads aired by Apple since the handset went on sale late last June. If you have yet to see the new iPhone Ads put out by Apple a few days ago, then take a look at them here. The first advertises the use of Facebook on the iPhone. It states: Two new advertising spots for Apple watchers to check out have been posted to Apple’s Web site, entitled “Facebook” and “Cars.” Both were designed to promote the iPhone as a Web surfing device. The “Facebook” ad reaches out to fans of the social networking service. “If you love Facebook so much that you check it every time you’re near the computer, just think about how great it would be to check it, well, every time you’re nowhere near the computer,” says the narrator.The “Cars” ad demonstrates the benefits of being able to surf the Web from the iPhone when shopping for an automobile. The user looks up the price of a car he’s interested in on the Kelley Blue Book Web site to make sure he’s getting a good deal.

We hope the creators of this application of FaceBook are ready. FaceBook has been known to experience down time in the past when third party applications or popular FaceBook features become suddenly popular. FaceBook has become as seemingly graphics and application heavy as MySpace lately, and I find the iPhone interface refreshing even on a regular browser as a break from all the visual noise. We may find us browsing the page in iPhone format more often just to give our eyes a break.

Its always good to track healthy competition and while we at Facebookblogged.com track round of news and developments at Facebookblogged.com. Here’s an update from Facebook’s Family Version.

Apparently, Kindo.com the super family social network has been funded by Skype’s founding engineers.

Kindo has won undisclosed seed funding from Estonia-based Ambient Sound Investments. In the seed round is Saul and Robin Klein of The Accelerator Group (TAG), and Stefan Glanzer, first investor in last.fm and executive chairman until the acquisition last year by CBS.

Like Mike Butcher says, Kindo has as much chance as any other site in this area, but being translated into so many languages from the word go creates a barrier to entry for a lot of competitors.

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CircleUp, Inc. is announcing the availability of powerful new messaging features on Facebook