Facebook is suing a Canadian company that specialises in online pornography, alleging that it hacked into the social networking site’s computers in an attempt to obtain the personal information of Facebook users.

An Ontario-based company that trades under the name SlickCash was named in a complaint filed last week by Facebook in San Jose, California.

According to wire reports, Facebook alleges that the SlickCash, which is run by a company called Istra Holdings, and a number of other defendants attempted to access Facebook's servers at least 200,000 times in a two-week period in June.

Court documents allege that "each of these requests sought to direct Facebook's computers to send information on other Facebook users back to (the defendant's internet) address.”

Facebook also claims that the alleged hacking attacks "were detected as unauthorised attempts to access and harvest proprietary information" and that "the defendants knowingly and without permission took, copied, or made use of, data from Facebook's proprietary computers and computer network".

It is not known exactly what information was allegedly stolen or copied from Facebook’s computer system.

Facebook first filed the suite in June and amended the complaint this month after a court order allowed it to identify who controlled the servers that it alleges were used to attack its site. The social network has requested a jury trial and is seeking damages and an order barring the defendants from accessing its computer systems in the future.

Facebook and SlickCash could not immediately be reached for comment.

Facebook solicits and stores information on its users ranging from their dates of birth and e-mail addresses to their religious and political views. The growing amounts of data being amassed are raising concerns from data watchdogs.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the body responsible for policing the UK’s data protection laws, recently gave warning that millions of Britons are disclosing inappropriate information on sites such as Facebook and called for the public to “wise up” to the potential risks of identity theft.

The ICO found that 60 per cent of users of social networks posted their date of birth, a quarter put their job title and almost one in 10 gave their home address.

Privacy concerns have already threatened to distract Facebook as it strives to reap profits from its vast user base.

The three-year-old site claims more than 55 million members and recently achieved an implied valuation of $15 billion (£7.2billion) after Microsoft took a minority stake.

However, it is expected to post a profit of only $30 million this year.

Recently, Facebook was forced to apologise after it angered its users by publicising details of their shopping habits without their permission.

Beacon, a new advertising system designed to tap into "the recommendation generation", had notified the online "friends" of Facebook members purchases made on retail sites outside of the social network.

Matt Fisher, of Centennial Software, the security group, said: “Anyone who uses social media websites such as Facebook needs to be aware of the potential for data theft.

"sers need to limit the amount of data they store on these sites so that there is not a sufficient volume of information to allow a criminal to commit identity theft. Storing your name and e-mail alone shouldn’t be enough, but information like address and telephone numbers can lead to a higher risk.”

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