China : Target of the Hackers.
From the data gathered from millions of Windows users, Microsoft releases Security Intelligence Report (SIR) provides an in-depth perspective on the changing threat landscape including software vulnerability disclosures and exploits. The latest report says, Chinese computer users are the major targets of online attackers. The report revealed that infection rates tend to be higher in developing countries/regions than in developed countries/regions as a general rule.
Internet Fraud doesn’t Get the Attention
Phishing, Malware and Viruses costs consumers $7.1 billion in 2007. But its a concern of many that most internet fraud is not prosecuted by US government. Even though loss by internet fraud is increased by $2 billion from the previous year,U.S. federal and state law enforcement authorities are doing little to resolve what has become a multi-billion-dollar problem. Phishing is an attempt to steal your personal data in the form of fraudulent e-mail or website claiming to be legitimate seeking identifiable information.
Google Gadgets can be a Security Threat
When its come to online security there is one more thing you need to worry about. Google Gadgets!. According to SecTheory a security consultancy firm,Google gadgets can be forcibly installed and can be used to phishing purposes. The potential impact of these attacks is through cookie theft, or theft of confidential and sensitive information from the Gadget or user. Its also revealed by the firm that a malicious webpage can add a Gadget to a user’s iGoogle homepage without his knowledge and assist in the spread of gadget-based malware. Google gadgets are miniature objects that offer useful and dynamic content which can be placed in personalized Google homepages. Its not known whether these kind of attacks can be prevented by Anti virus programs.
Malware “court jester” attacks Facebook
IT security and control firm Sophos has warned users of Facebook to exercise care, following an attempt by hackers to infect computers by spreading messages containing malicious links on the popular social networking website. The recent attack comes in the form of Wall Messages left on Facebook users’ to view a video, but clicking on the link takes users to a site which urges them to download a file to watch the movie. Sophos says it detects the executable file as the Troj/Dloadr-BPL Trojan horse, which in turn downloads further malicious code (detected as Troj/Agent-HJX), and displays an innocent image of a court jester sticking his tongue out.
Blogspot No:1 host of Malware
Blogspot, owned by Google, alone accounting for nearly 2 percent of all malware hosts,says Sophos a leading anti virus vendor. According to Sophos every 5 seconds one web page with malware is being detected. Sophos finds just over 16,000 malicious pages each day, mostly the result of malicious SQL-injection attacks on legitimate websites. Sophos is a UK based company mainly focuses on the business market unlike other security companies.
