The potential damage a hacker or spammer can do if they obtain access to your Facebook account can be devastating. While Facebook unfortunately can’t send you an alert every time that happens, there is one invader they can warn you about: the watchful eye of the government.

Alex Stamos, the Chief Security Officer at Facebook, announced last week that Facebook will begin notifying users if Facebook believes that an account has been targeted or possibly compromised by an attacker who is suspected of working on behalf of a nation-state.

The message appears as follows:

While Facebook is not sharing how they calculate who is behind such attacks, they obviously felt the need that such a warning was warranted. Stamos explained:

While we have always taken steps to secure accounts that we believe to have been compromised, we decided to show this additional warning if we have a strong suspicion that an attack could be government-sponsored. We do this because these types of attacks tend to be more advanced and dangerous than others, and we strongly encourage affected people to take the actions necessary to secure all of their online accounts.

As Ronald Reagan said, the nine most terrifying words in the English language are, ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’ Almost as disconcerting is the thought that the government could be reading your private messages. Facebook’s warning about possible attacks on users’ accounts is likely to be met with positive reaction towards the social site, and a heightened animosity towards government officials for encroaching on the lives of their private citizens.

Of course this raises another question: just how frequently is the government attempting to hack into peoples’ social media accounts? While that remains a mystery, one thing is clear: such attempts are common enough that Facebook felt the need to warn users.

Via Mashable