Facebook will be closed for maintenance between Feb 29-31 – joke chain letter spreads

Messages have been spreading on Facebook claiming that the social network will be closed between February 29th and February 31st, 2013.

And, of course, it’s kinda true. You won’t be able to log into Facebook on February 29th, February 30th or February 31st this year. Nor will you have much luck, although the messages don’t mention this, on June 31st.

Umm.. that’s because those days don’t exist.

Clearly whoever started spreading this message intended it as a practical joke – but it seems some users have taken it at face value and shared it with their friends, unaware of the silliness.

The messages appear to be particularly prevalent in French – maybe it was a gallic wag who started off the chain letter?

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

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Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the anti-virus industry having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent security analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of computer security, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter at @gcluley, on Mastodon at @[email protected], or drop him an email.