“Dancing Girl” Video of Fake Facebook Installs Malware

A new Facebook video malware attack is in the wild, disguising as a message from Facebook. Websense, an online security firm, claims the malware distributes through mails appearing as private messages from Facebook and uses the method of known fake codec infection.

In the attack, users receive a mail signed as Facebook message with headlines like "At Striptease Dance Party", "super beautiful girl dancing", "dancing girl drunk in the pub", "Hot Girl Dancing" etc. The mail also contains a harmful link. On clicking the link, users are taken to a third party website which looks like Facebook that has used stolen graphics and similar URLs to look authentic.

Then, the page loads what seems to be a video of a dancing woman in the Facebook page and the browser asks the user if he/she wishes to install an executable file named "Adobe_Player11.exe" which, obviously, is not an Adobe program. Rather, it is a collection of malicious programs that will damage the system.

If the file is installed, it enables the hacker to access the infected system. In addition, this particular file has minimum antivirus coverage.

Security experts claim that fake codec is a famous mode of targeting users. Attacking websites usually makes use of striking and obscene movie files as a lure to malware infections appeared as video codecs.

The new technique of malware circulation is an indication that hackers are increasingly using social networking sites to launch attacks, circulate harmful programs and phishing campaigns.

In the mean time, security experts also add that in spite of the security loopholes, Facebook is operating fairly well. It is only a matter of time that malware authors succeeded in launching their vile acts against the social networking site.

In the last few months, the use of Facebook as an attack mode has become famous among malware distributors and creators. Lately, a rogue program called "error check system" was found circulating over the website. During 2008, the Koobface caused havoc for several users of Facebook.

Related article: “Loopholes did not cause online banking thefts”: ICBC

» SPAMfighter News - 3/17/2009