Cyber Assaults Against Social-Networking Websites Doubled During 2010

In its yearly Security Threat Report 2011, Sophos indicates that malware, phishing and spam attacks against websites for social networking became twofold during 2010 over that of 2009. Msnbc.msn.com reported this on January 19, 2011.

Elaborates Sophos that since the websites for social networking, particularly Facebook have been growing rapidly, attackers were increasingly targeting them.

Understandably, Sophos enquired from users of social networks if they'd been attacked with malware, spam or phishing during December 2010. In response, 67% of users said that they encountered spam (increasing from 33.4% during April 2009); 43% reported of phishing e-mails (increasing from 21%); and 40% told of experiencing malware attacks (up from 21.2%).

Remarking about these remarkable discoveries, Senior Technology Consultant Graham Cluley for Sophos stated that anyone infiltrating the account of a Facebook user would find a huge repository of valuable information, comprising personal details as well as data of numerous friends and relatives. Msnbc.msn.com published this on January 19, 2011.

Cluley explained that the hacker only required tricking the accountholder in a way that he'd reveal those personal details after which they could be utilized to commit ID-theft, alternatively sold to other cyber-criminals.

That, according to Cluley, wasn't simply a hazard, which domestic surfers encountered since numerous people accessed and used their accounts on social networks while in offices, causing businesses too to be attacked through such sites. Eweek.com reported this on January 19, 2011.

Cluley added that undoubtedly cyber-criminals were exhibiting an enthusiasm for the social-networking websites far greater than ever earlier.

And although Facebook admitted that security threats posed a challenge to it, the company treated the problem with the notion that Facebook.com was a field for malware mining.

Remarked a Spokesperson of Facebook that consequent of its efforts, there'd been a decline in the success of malware, spam as well as other assaults against Facebook as was evident from the data available with it regarding interactions of over 500m users of the site. The Spokesperson added that it was far more vital for evaluating the attacks' success than it was for evaluating their quantity. Securecomputing.net.au published this on January 20, 2011.

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» SPAMfighter News - 1/27/2011