Sites Hosting User Content Open Opportunities for Security Threats

According to a recent report from security company Commtouch, considerable increase in content generated from user participation has resulted in fresh Internet security threats.

The report named 'Internet Threats Trend Report' for the last quarter of 2008 reveals that streaming download and media sites are among the ten most highly malware infested websites tainted by phishing. These two kinds of websites commonly include content generated by user.

Amir Lev, Chief Technology Officer, Commtouch, said that with a huge growth in user created content on file sharing networks, social networks and blogs over the recent years, malicious code writers and spammers have been developing new techniques to involve users, as reported by WebProNews on January 12, 2009.

Moreover, spammers are still exploiting lawful sites such as Google Docs to elude systems that filter content. In December 2008, one such attempt was observed in which e-mails seemed to have arrived from Google Docs with the help of the "Share" feature while all the recipients were Gmail users. The message content contained offers of totally unrelated services like gambling and prescription drugs.

Security researchers said that the spammers typically used techniques of randomization that would change message titles and bodies automatically; thereby, hiding traces of bulk spam mail distribution and bypassing some anti-spam and antivirus software.

The report further revealed that during October end 2008, there had emerged an increasing trend in the spread of blended malware threats and Chinese language spam. A recent onslaught of Chinese e-cards might exemplify it suitably. The threat was a blend of spam mails with links leading to malware-infested websites, and HTML attachments. The link and the HTML file would result in the download and installation of the malevolent boss.exe file.

Thus, a growing volume of blended malware has surfaced with the rise in new avenues for infecting users' systems, said security experts. Such sites are increasingly becoming targets of fresh and more complex campaigns, making mandatory for end-users, service providers and vendors to be more aware and to deploy protective measures.

Related article: Stock Spamming On the Rise

» SPAMfighter News - 19-01-2009

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