An unfortunate side effect of any news-worthy disasters of the modern day is that a wave of malware will often follow in the virtual world after the initial event in the physical world. The large earthquake (8.3 on the Richter scale) last night recorded off the coast of Western Samoa and the subsequent tsunami that followed caused much destruction and loss of life to the islands near the epicentre of the quake. As with any large scale disasters that quickly become major news events, people want to know what happened and to know that loved ones are safe. The Web, being a major source of information to many people around the world, is one of the first places to see such information-seeking activity. For many people, search engines are the gateway to the masses of information available and because of this, it is also one of the first places to be targeted by malware creators. They waste no time in getting their malicious software and web sites set up and poisoning the Web...
Symantec has observed that most phishing URLs associated with Chinese brands attempt to trick users by stating that they are winners of a great prize. The fake websites declare that the visitors are winners for reasons such as:
1. Customers of the brand were chosen for a lucky draw and that the customer won the draw.
2. The brand wishes to thank the customer for their long time commitment by gifting them prizes.
3. The customer has triumphed in a gaming site of the brand, attaining the highest score.
The phishing site goes on to state that the customer needs to submit confidential information to receive the prize, either to prove his or her identity or for the transfer of the prize money to the customer’s bank account. The following image is an example of a Chinese phishing page for a gaming website. The page says that the customer needs to enter details to prove his or her identity so as to...
Overall spam volumes averaged at 87 percent of all email messages in August 2009, which is a decrease of 2 percent since July 2009. Health spam, which decreased by 17 percent in July, also decreased again in August and averaged at 6.73 percent. It is interesting to note that over 29 percent of spam is now Internet-related spam. Internet-related spam attacks are those that specifically offer or advertise Internet- or computer-related goods and services. Examples include attacks promoting Web hosting, Web design, and spamware-related products and services.
Holiday spam campaigns have also begun taking advantage of Halloween and Christmas. This follows closely after Labor Day-related spam in a nod to what some economists predict will be a very difficult holiday season for legitimate retailers.
