How They Worm Their Way In
In my last post, I related how the other week I was infected by a particularly insidious computer worm. I can’t be certain how it got into my machine, but I have some well-sourced* theories.
Computer viruses or worms can be sophisticatedly coded, but they normally still need a clueless human to assist – much like a cold virus is dependent on sick people coming to work or school to spread. It's called social engineering, and here are some common ploys to get you (and me, sad to say) to do the dirty work.
Google Images
I periodically download images from Google Images to serve as art placeholders in brochures or to augment blog posts. Some of these images are embedded with malicious code, typically Trojans that work without you noticing. My AV software noticed when I tried to pull down one such image and quarantined the bugger; but Trojans are tweaked continually to stay ahead of AV updates. And Bing and Yahoo are not any less risky.
Twitter
It used to be if you looked closely at a fake URL, you could tell it didn’t take you to the proper site and could ignore it. But Twitter users frequently use abbreviated URLs to save characters, making it triply hard to tell if the link is legit. Malware loves when you use a third-party application to post a picture, too. Think twice before clicking a tweet link, especially if you aren’t familiar with the follower.
Facebook
The bad guys have been taking advantage of Facebook users for years, such as sending messages about hilarious videos. Like email-born worms of the past, they raid your catalog of friends and spam them in texts that appear to be from you, a trusted user. Or one of your friends, whom you trust. The social network is a giant Petri dish of promiscuity (and I'm not just talking about the one in six divorces that now cite Facebook as a factor). Be careful with your connections.
Flash drives
In one famous DoD breach, cybercriminals dumped a bunch of infected flash drives in a Pentagon parking lot, knowing at least one employee would grab one and insert it into a machine (connected to the network, of course) to see what was on it. If people paid to be paranoid are that gullible, what chance do the rest of us stand?
Charlie Sheen
Whatever celebrity is trending upward, like a highly paid actor having a very public meltdown, expect hackers to be using that rising popularity to help infest computers – especially Web-enabled smartphones. They set up malicious sites and then manipulate Google’s algorithm to rise in page ranks. With 60,000 new forms of malware unleashed daily, there’s no way your AV software can keep up.
Right now, it’s Charlie Sheen. Before it was the Winklevoss twins when The Social Network was big at the box office, which may be a little surprising, unlike the cast of Jersey Shore (and don’t pretend you don’t know who I am talking about...).
*I intentionally left out links, but I have them if you want them. Just email me.
Computer viruses or worms can be sophisticatedly coded, but they normally still need a clueless human to assist – much like a cold virus is dependent on sick people coming to work or school to spread. It's called social engineering, and here are some common ploys to get you (and me, sad to say) to do the dirty work.
Google Images
I periodically download images from Google Images to serve as art placeholders in brochures or to augment blog posts. Some of these images are embedded with malicious code, typically Trojans that work without you noticing. My AV software noticed when I tried to pull down one such image and quarantined the bugger; but Trojans are tweaked continually to stay ahead of AV updates. And Bing and Yahoo are not any less risky.
It used to be if you looked closely at a fake URL, you could tell it didn’t take you to the proper site and could ignore it. But Twitter users frequently use abbreviated URLs to save characters, making it triply hard to tell if the link is legit. Malware loves when you use a third-party application to post a picture, too. Think twice before clicking a tweet link, especially if you aren’t familiar with the follower.
The bad guys have been taking advantage of Facebook users for years, such as sending messages about hilarious videos. Like email-born worms of the past, they raid your catalog of friends and spam them in texts that appear to be from you, a trusted user. Or one of your friends, whom you trust. The social network is a giant Petri dish of promiscuity (and I'm not just talking about the one in six divorces that now cite Facebook as a factor). Be careful with your connections.
Flash drives
In one famous DoD breach, cybercriminals dumped a bunch of infected flash drives in a Pentagon parking lot, knowing at least one employee would grab one and insert it into a machine (connected to the network, of course) to see what was on it. If people paid to be paranoid are that gullible, what chance do the rest of us stand?
Charlie Sheen
Whatever celebrity is trending upward, like a highly paid actor having a very public meltdown, expect hackers to be using that rising popularity to help infest computers – especially Web-enabled smartphones. They set up malicious sites and then manipulate Google’s algorithm to rise in page ranks. With 60,000 new forms of malware unleashed daily, there’s no way your AV software can keep up.
Right now, it’s Charlie Sheen. Before it was the Winklevoss twins when The Social Network was big at the box office, which may be a little surprising, unlike the cast of Jersey Shore (and don’t pretend you don’t know who I am talking about...).
*I intentionally left out links, but I have them if you want them. Just email me.
