Mar 05 2024

Facebook, Instagram and Threads kicking users off with password reset

Category: Social networkdisc7 @ 10:56 am
https://www.theregister.com/2024/03/05/facebook_instagram_outage/

Millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced

Tue 5 Mar 2024 // 16:16 UTC

UPDATED Those trying to log into Meta’s Facebook, Instagram, and Threads for their social media fixes are facing panic this morning after being locked out of their accounts.

“We’re aware people are having trouble accessing our services. We are working on this now,” Meta spokesperson Andy Stone said in a post on the social media site formerly known at Twitter. The latter site still up and running, presumably much to Elon’s delight.

“We are aware of an issue impacting Facebook Login. Our engineering teams are actively looking to resolve the issue as quickly as possible,” Meta said on its status page in a post timestamped at 0717 PT.

Folks trying to log into the Meta-owned accounts are told their passwords are wrong. Those trying to reset their password using two-factor authentication are told there’s an error and to try again. Needless to say it isn’t working.

According to Downdetector over half a million users logged complaints, a huge number given the reports are usually counted in the low thousands. The problems appear to have kicked off around 0700 PT (1500 UTC) but now appear to be dropping very slightly.

We’ll update this article as the situation progresses but in the meantime don’t panic – you haven’t been hacked. On the balance of probabilities it’s probably someone pushing the wrong button.

Let’s not forget, we’ve been here before and these things sort themselves out (usually). Âź

Updated to add

The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) was holding pre-scheduled press briefings this morning on election security and naturally the outage was one of the first questions asked.

“We are aware of the incident and at this time we are not aware of any specific election nexus or any specific malicious cyber activity nexus to the outage. But we are aware of the incident and the global scope of it,” a CISA spokesperson said.

It’s a big day for the US today: Super Tuesday, where 15 states elect delegates to decide which candidates will run for the presidency (Hint: It’s Trump v Biden). The outage has already set conspiracy theorists all aflutter, and some hacking groups are claiming responsibility for a cyber attack, in both cases without any evidence.

Final update

All services now appears to be coming back online.

“We are recovering from an earlier outage impacting Facebook Login, and services are in the process of being restored. We apologize for any inconvenience that this may have caused,” Meta said at 0907 PT.

Tags: facebook, Meta, outage


Dec 16 2022

Facebook Infrastructure Used by Hackers in Phishing Attack Chain

Category: Hacking,PhishingDISC @ 9:39 am

This recent phishing campaign tricks victims by using Facebook posts in its chain of attacks. The emails that were sent to the targets made it appear as though one of the recipients’ Facebook posts violated copyright, and they threatened to remove their accounts if no appeal was made within 48 hours.

https://www.trustwave.com/media/19406/picture1yu.png?v=0.0.1
Phishing email message

“The content of this Facebook post appears legitimate because it uses a dummy ‘Page Support’ profile with the Facebook logo as its display picture. At first glance, the page looks legitimate, but the link provided in this post leads to an external domain”, according to Trustwave.

Here the Facebook post pretends to be “Page Support,” using a Facebook logo to appear as if the company manages it.

https://www.trustwave.com/media/19407/picture2yu.png?v=0.0.1
Facebook post masqueraded as a support page

The main phishing URL, hxxps:/meta[.]forbusinessuser[.]xyz/main[.]php, which resembles Facebook’s copyright appeal page, is reached by clicking the link in the post.

https://www.trustwave.com/media/19408/picture3yu.png?v=0.0.1

Particularly, any data that victims enter into the form after hitting the send button, along with the victim’s client IP and geolocation data will be forwarded to hackers.

Also, threat actors may gather more data to get through fingerprinting protections or security questions while gaining access to the victim’s Facebook account.

The victim is then redirected to the next phishing website, where a false 6-digit one-time password (OTP) request with a timer is displayed.

https://www.trustwave.com/media/19395/picture10yu.png?v=0.0.1
Phishing page with OTP request

Any code entered by the victim will fail, and if the “Need another way to authenticate?” button is pressed, the site will redirect to the real Facebook site.

According to Trustwave, multiple Facebook profiles have fake messages that look to be support pages and direct users to phishing websites.

Various Facebook accounts promoting the same fake alerts
Various Facebook accounts promoting the same fake alerts 

Therefore, these fake Facebook ‘Violation’ notifications use real Facebook pages to redirect to external phishing sites. Users are urged to take extreme caution when receiving false violation alerts and to not fall for the initial links’ seeming legitimacy.

The Totally Awesome Phish Trivia Book: Uncover The History & Facts Every Phish Head Should Know! 

InfoSecBooks | Tools | Services

Tags: facebook, Facebook Infrastructure, phishing


Jun 12 2013

Why you should care about your digital privacy?

Category: Information Privacy,Information SecurityDISC @ 4:25 pm

English: Infographic on how Social Media are b...

English: Infographic on how Social Media are being used, and how everything is changed by them. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Surveillance Countermeasures

When we use internet browser for a web search, social media site, communication (skype), buy something from a site, we are leaving digital tracks all over the internet. Your service provider of the above services have access to this information because they are collecting  this treasure trove to identify and figure out what you like and don’t like so they can serve you appropriate ads and services accordingly. Most importantly they want to know that what you may buy or do next on the internet.

Well now we know that our government is utilizing that data as well from these providers to figure out if you may have some ties with the bad elements out there. To elaborate a bit at this point, for example, if a bad guy call you and left a message on you voice mail, you are presumed guilty by association and you and your friends may come under heavy surveillance after this incident.  So far all this collection and analysis of data has been done without your knowledge and permission.

As Mark Zukerberg said that Facebook only provide information which is required by law. Well in this case the law (PRISM) wants everything without warrant. By using social media we create a treasure trove of data, which can be analyzed to figure out patterns, one may deduce what that person may do next. You may want to remember that when you post next time on a social media.




Tags: Business, facebook, Internet Marketing, PRISM, Social media, Social network, Twitter, YouTube


Oct 23 2012

The Rise of Malicious Traffic on Networks and how it Infect

Category: MalwareDISC @ 4:12 pm

 

Malware logo Crystal 128.

Malware logo Crystal 128. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Sophisticated malicious attacks can go largely undetected by most antivirus software.  Defense in depth approach requires organizations to monitor for malicious activity, malware (bot traffic) at various levels of the network, perimeter layer, application level and subsequently at critical data level.

How an end user might become infected, the obvious scenario being possibly our less educated users who could potentially be clicking in links in email messages from senders they might not be aware of or people visiting some high-risk sites such as those offering free downloads. The second scenario which is less obvious is where a user may click a link from a known good site which may contain a link to a bad site. The most common situation here is where advertising may have been purchased and site owners may not have been able to perform the due diligence to make sure a reputable company has purchased the ad space. Finally we’ve got our third and scarier scenario where a trusted site has actually been compromised and infected with some kind of malware.

According to Symantec‘s most recent Internet Security Threat Report, Global networks faced more than 286 million cyberthreats in 2010, as attackers employed more sophisticated methods that make malware harder to detect and more difficult to remove. Furthermore, the number of Web-based attacks increased 93% in 2010, and malware writers have been turning their attention to social-networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook, where it’s estimated that 17% of links are connected to malware.

So the malicious activity is on the rise based on the Symantec report, which emphasis the point to monitor and evaluate the harmful traffic into your network.  Malicious activity monitoring also requires an effective incident handling procedures to analyze, evaluate and taking appropriate actions with malicious events at hand.  An incident handling procedures also differentiate the event from incident meaning when an event turn into an incident.

Real time malicious activity monitoring at perimeter will work nicely with ISO 27001 (ISMS) process. It will not only satisfy the auditor need for monitoring and maintaining of certain controls in the standard  but also new threats to the organization will serve as a feed to required risk assessment process which can be evaluated against relevant vulnerabilities.

Below are some of the famous malicious attacks which can be used to breach network:

 SQL injection—By analysing the URL syntax of targeted websites, hackers are able to embed instructions to upload malware that gives them remote access to the target servers.

 Exploiting system vulnerabilities in another method—In many cases, laptops, desktops, and servers do not have the latest security patches deployed, which creates a gap in the security posture. Gaps or system vulnerabilities can also be created by improper computer or security configurations. Cyber-criminals search for and exploit these weaknesses to gain access to the corporate network and confidential information.

 Targeted malware—Cybercriminals use spam, email, and instant message communications often disguised to come from known entities to direct users to websites that are compromised with malware. This section includes several different approaches that cybercriminals leverage to infect systems with malicious code.




Tags: anti virus, facebook, Internet security, Malware, Security, Symantec


Jan 11 2011

Biggest mobile malware threat

Category: Malware,Smart Phone,Web 2.0DISC @ 2:39 pm
Image representing Facebook as depicted in Cru...
Image via CrunchBase

Facebook is biggest mobile malware threat, says security firm
Researcher claims bad links on Facebook responsible for much higher infection rate that targeted mobile malware

By Joan Goodchild -CSO

The biggest mobile infection threat isn’t malware that specifically targets mobile devices, according to new research from security firm BitDefender. Malware that targets Facebook is a far bigger problem for mobile security, the firm claims.

Spam links on social networks are infecting mobile devices via bad links on Facebook because the worms and other malware are often platform-independent and are widely spread as malware that targets PCs.

BitDefender officials point to Google statistics, which reveal almost one quarter of Facebook users who fell for a recent scam on the social network did so from their mobile device. The URL that was studied was one that claimed to show users a girl’s Facebook status which got her expelled from school. It generated 28,672 clicks — 24 percent of which originated from mobile platforms. Users who clicked on the link — whether on their PC or mobile device — downloaded a Facebook worm and fell victim to an adword-based money grabbing scheme.

“When data security researchers focus on finding malware specifically designed for mobile platforms, they lose sight of an important mobile platform threat source — the social network,” said George Petre, BitDefender Threat Intelligence Team Leader.

Mobile Malware Attacks and Defense

The Truth About Facebook – Privacy Settings Every Facebook User Should Know, and Much More – The Facts You Should Know




Tags: facebook, Google, Koobface, Malware, Mobile device, Mobile operating system, Social network, Uniform Resource Locator


Apr 25 2010

Facebook Accounts Hacked; 1.5 Million Login IDs For Sale?

Category: Cybercrime,Security BreachDISC @ 1:57 am

Russian Hacker ‘Kirllos’ Claims He Stole Accounts of 1 in 300 Facebook Users

By LIZ HERON

Want a great deal on a Facebook account? A Russian hacker who calls himself “kirllos” claims he can sell you 1,000 unsuspecting users’ login credentials for just $25, or $45 if the accounts have more than 10 friends each.

The hacker is believed to have stolen the IDs of 1.5 million Facebook users. If accurate, that means one out of every 300 Facebook users may have been victimized. Kirllos is selling the information on an underground hacker website, according to VeriSign’s iDefense Labs. The cybersecurity company estimates that kirllos has sold around 700,000 accounts so far, but VeriSign was unable to verify if any of the accounts are legitimate accounts belonging to real Facebook users.

Kirllos’ prices are incredibly cheap compared to other scams for sale. E-mail usernames and passwords usually fetch between $1 to $20 each, according to Symantec’s latest Internet Security Threat Report. In contrast, Kirllos is claiming he will sell accounts for as little as 25 cents each.

According to Mashable, hacking Facebook “isn’t a new hobby for this person.” The site has a screenshot of another offer kirllos allegedly made last year when he claimed to be selling 100,000 compromised accounts.

Users whose Facebook ID’s and passwords have been stolen could be vulnerable to identity theft or even “more insidious scams,” Mashable says.

Facebook is investigating the specific accounts kirllos has put up for sale, and will block access to those that have been hacked until they can be restored to their original users, according to Facebook’s Simon Axten.

“We invest heavily in helping people keep their accounts secure and have a team of security professionals who investigate specific attacks on our users and work with law enforcement to pursue those responsible,” Axten said.

Users can find more details the process Facebook uses to spot hacked accounts and go to Facebook’s security page to learn more about protecting themselves online. Here is more information on what to do if your account has been compromised and how to report a hacked account.




Tags: facebook, kirllos, russian hacker


Jan 22 2010

If Your Password Is 123456, Just Make It HackMe

Category: Information SecurityDISC @ 2:20 pm

by Ashlee Vance, NYTimes

Back at the dawn of the Web, the most popular account password was “12345.”

Today, it’s one digit longer but hardly safer: “123456.”

Despite all the reports of Internet security breaches over the years, including the recent attacks on Google’s e-mail service, many people have reacted to the break-ins with a shrug.

According to a new analysis, one out of five Web users still decides to leave the digital equivalent of a key under the doormat: they choose a simple, easily guessed password like “abc123,” “iloveyou” or even “password” to protect their data.

“I guess it’s just a genetic flaw in humans,” said Amichai Shulman, the chief technology officer at Imperva, which makes software for blocking hackers. “We’ve been following the same patterns since the 1990s.”

Mr. Shulman and his company examined a list of 32 million passwords that an unknown hacker stole last month from RockYou, a company that makes software for users of social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace. The list was briefly posted on the Web, and hackers and security researchers downloaded it. (RockYou, which had already been widely criticized for lax privacy practices, has advised its customers to change their passwords, as the hacker gained information about their e-mail accounts as well.)

The trove provided an unusually detailed window into computer users’ password habits. Typically, only government agencies like the F.B.I. or the National Security Agency have had access to such a large password list.

“This was the mother lode,” said Matt Weir, a doctoral candidate in the e-crimes and investigation technology lab at Florida State University, where researchers are also examining the data.

Imperva found that nearly 1 percent of the 32 million people it studied had used “123456” as a password. The second-most-popular password was “12345.” Others in the top 20 included “qwerty,” “abc123” and “princess.”

More disturbing, said Mr. Shulman, was that about 20 percent of people on the RockYou list picked from the same, relatively small pool of 5,000 passwords.

That suggests that hackers could easily break into many accounts just by trying the most common passwords. Because of the prevalence of fast computers and speedy networks, hackers can fire off thousands of password guesses per minute.

“We tend to think of password guessing as a very time-consuming attack in which I take each account and try a large number of name-and-password combinations,” Mr. Shulman said. “The reality is that you can be very effective by choosing a small number of common passwords.”

Some Web sites try to thwart the attackers by freezing an account for a certain period of time if too many incorrect passwords are typed. But experts say that the hackers simply learn to trick the system, by making guesses at an acceptable rate, for instance.

To improve security, some Web sites are forcing users to mix letters, numbers and even symbols in their passwords. Others, like Twitter, prevent people from picking common passwords.

Still, researchers say, social networking and entertainment Web sites often try to make life simpler for their users and are reluctant to put too many controls in place.

Even commercial sites like eBay must weigh the consequences of freezing accounts, since a hacker could, say, try to win an auction by freezing the accounts of other bidders.

Overusing simple passwords is not a new phenomenon. A similar survey examined computer passwords used in the mid-1990s and found that the most popular ones at that time were “12345,” “abc123” and “password.”

Why do so many people continue to choose easy-to-guess passwords, despite so many warnings about the risks?

Security experts suggest that we are simply overwhelmed by the sheer number of things we have to remember in this digital age.

“Nowadays, we have to keep probably 10 times as many passwords in our head as we did 10 years ago,” said Jeff Moss, who founded a popular hacking conference and is now on the Homeland Security Advisory Council. “Voice mail passwords, A.T.M. PINs and Internet passwords — it’s so hard to keep track of.”

In the idealized world championed by security specialists, people would have different passwords for every Web site they visit and store them in their head or, if absolutely necessary, on a piece of paper.

But bowing to the reality of our overcrowded brains, the experts suggest that everyone choose at least two different passwords — a complex one for Web sites were security is vital, such as banks and e-mail, and a simpler one for places where the stakes are lower, such as social networking and entertainment sites.

Mr. Moss relies on passwords at least 12 characters long, figuring that those make him a more difficult target than the millions of people who choose five- and six-character passwords.

“It’s like the joke where the hikers run into a bear in the forest, and the hiker that survives is the one who outruns his buddy,” Mr. Moss said. “You just want to run that bit faster.”




Tags: facebook, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Florida State University, Google, MySpace, RockYou, Security, Social network service


Dec 28 2009

Hackers’ attacks rise in volume, sophistication

Category: Information SecurityDISC @ 6:41 pm

digital-hijack


Year in review for online security attacks – 2009 is going to be known as a year of change in tactics of exploitation, rather than creating more new tools in hacker’s community. They are utilizing social media as a tool to exploit and using built-in trust in social media to their advantage. That’s why stealing social media accounts are considered as a treasure trove in hacker’s community to spread malwares (rogue anti-virus) which helps them to steal personal and private information. This perhaps was another reason why social media community was busy in 2009 changing their security and privacy policy on a frequent basis. Do you think, as social media grow, so does the threat to personal and private information?.


At the same time 2009 comes to an end with a bang with an appointment of Howard Schmidt by Obama’s administration as a cybersecurity coordinator. A great choice indeed but why it took them a whole year to make this important decision. This indecision will cost them, no matter how you look at it. Now hopefully the current administration is going to keep the politics aside and take his recommendations seriously to make up for the lost time.

Alejandro MartĂ­nez-Cabrera, SF Chronicle

Security experts describe the typical hacker of 2009 as more sophisticated, prolific and craftier than ever. If anything, criminals will be remembered by the sheer number of attacks they unleashed upon the Web.

While the year didn’t see many technological leaps in the techniques hackers employ, they continued to expand their reach to every corner of the Internet by leveraging social media, infiltrating trusted Web sites, and crafting more convincing and tailored scams.

Although there were a handful of firsts – like the first iPhone worm – most attacks in 2009 were near-identical to tactics used in prior years, changing only in the victims they targeted and their level of sophistication.

One of the most preoccupying trends was personalized attacks designed to steal small and medium business owners’ online banking credentials. The scheme was particularly damaging because banks take less responsibility for the monetary losses of businesses than of individual consumers in identity theft cases.

In October, the FBI estimated small and medium businesses have lost at least $40 million to cyber-crime since 2004.

Attacks continued to plague larger organizations. The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday that the FBI was investigating the online theft of tens of millions of dollars from Citigroup, which has denied the incident.

Alan Paller, director of research at the SANS Institute, said criminals shifted the focus of their tactics from developing attack techniques to improving the social engineering of their scams.

“It’s not the tools but the skills. That’s a new idea,” he said.

One example is rogue antivirus schemes, which often trick computer users with a fake infection. Criminals then obtain their victims’ credit card information as they pay for a false product, all the while installing the very malicious software they were seeking to repel.

Even though these scams have been around for several years, they have become more a popular tactic among criminals because they pressure potential victims into making on-the-spot decisions.

“People have been told to look out for viruses and want to do the right thing. There’s security awareness now, but the criminals are taking advantage of their limited knowledge,” said Mike Dausin, a researcher with network security firm TippingPoint’s DVLabs.

Chester Wisniewski, senior adviser for software security firm Sophos, said social networks also continued to be an important target for attackers. Despite Facebook and Twitter’s efforts to beef up their security, it has become a common tactic for scammers to hijack Facebook accounts and post malicious links on the walls of the victim’s friends or distribute harmful content through tweets.

“We haven’t had this before – a place where all kinds of people go and dump their information, which makes it very valuable for criminals,” Wisniewski said. “It’s kind of a gold mine for identity thieves to get on people’s Facebook account.”

Using PDFs
Another common ploy was malicious software that piggybacked on common third-party applications like Adobe PDFs and Flash animations.

Although Adobe scrambled this year to improve its software update procedures and roll out patches more frequently, criminals have increasingly exploited the coding flaws in Adobe products in particular because of their ubiquity and the abundance of vulnerable old code, said Roel Schouwenberg, senior virus analyst at Kaspersky Lab.

By using ad networks or taking advantage of exploitable Web programming errors to insert malicious content, criminals cemented their presence in legitimate Web sites and made 2009, according to anti-malware firm Dasient, the year of the “drive-by download,” in which users only have to visit a compromised Web site to become infected.

An October report from the San Jose company estimated that 640,000 legitimate Web sites became infected in the third quarter of 2009, compared with 120,000 infected sites during the same period of 2008.

Damaging reputations
The trend was not only a security threat for consumers, but also stood to damage the reputation and traffic of the victimized Web sites. In September, a fake antivirus pop-up made its way into the New York Times’ Web site by infiltrating the company’s ad network.

Researchers also noted a high volume of attacks disguised as content related to popular news items – anything from Michael Jackson to the swine flu – to coax Web users into downloading malicious content. This closing year also saw a handful of notorious politically motivated online attacks, and the issue of national cybersecurity continued to gain prominence.

On Dec. 18, Twitter’s home page was defaced by hackers calling themselves the “Iranian Cyber Army,” although authorities said there was no evidence they were in fact connected to Iran. An August attack on a Georgian blogger also indirectly affected the popular microblogging site and brought it down for several hours.

In July, several U.S. and South Korean government Web sites went offline after being hit by a denial-of-service attack that South Korea has attributed to a North Korean ministry. U.S. defense officials revealed in April that hackers have stolen thousands of files on one of the military’s most advanced fighter aircrafts.

“Now it’s in the agenda of every government to pay attention to the cyberworld,” Schouwenberg said.

Security coordinator
On Tuesday, the White House announced the appointment of Howard A. Schmidt as the Obama administration’s new cybersecurity coordinator. Schmidt occupied a similar post under the Bush administration.

Even though crime continued to evolve into a more organized and compartmentalized operation this year, experts believe a new White House administration conscientious of threats and partnerships between law enforcement agencies and security firms offer encouraging signs for next year.

An example is the Conficker Work Group, an international industry coalition that joined to mitigate the spread of the Conficker worm. The group also collaborates with law enforcement agencies by providing them with forensic information.

“It’s the first time I’ve seen such partnership between countries. Typically it’s the Wild West and nobody is in charge of anything. Now it’s clear there’s a lot more international collaboration,” Dausin said.




Tags: antivirus, cybersecurity coordinator, Denial-of-service attack, facebook, hacker, howard schmidt, Identity Theft, iPhone, Law enforcement agency, Malware, Michael Jackson, South Korea, Twitter


Dec 14 2009

Viruses That Leave Victims Red in the Facebook

Category: MalwareDISC @ 3:21 pm

5 Ways to Cultivate an Active Social Network
Image by Intersection Consulting via Flickr

By BRAD STONE – NYTimes.com

It used to be that computer viruses attacked only your hard drive. Now they attack your dignity.

Malicious programs are rampaging through Web sites like Facebook and Twitter, spreading themselves by taking over people’s accounts and sending out messages to all of their friends and followers. The result is that people are inadvertently telling their co-workers and loved ones how to raise their I.Q.’s or make money instantly, or urging them to watch an awesome new video in which they star.

“I wonder what people are thinking of me right now?” said Matt Marquess, an employee at a public relations firm in San Francisco whose Twitter account was recently hijacked, showering his followers with messages that appeared to offer a $500 gift card to Victoria’s Secret.

Mr. Marquess was clueless about the offers until a professional acquaintance asked him about them via e-mail. Confused, he logged in to his account and noticed he had been promoting lingerie for five days.

“No one had said anything to me,” he said. “I thought, how long have I been Twittering about underwear?”

The humiliation sown by these attacks is just collateral damage. In most cases, the perpetrators are hoping to profit from the referral fees they get for directing people to sketchy e-commerce sites.

In other words, even the crooks are on social networks now — because millions of tightly connected potential victims are just waiting for them there.

Often the victims lose control of their accounts after clicking on a link “sent” by a friend. In other cases, the bad guys apparently scan for accounts with easily guessable passwords. (Mr. Marquess gamely concedes that his password at the time was “abc123.”)

After discovering their accounts have been seized, victims typically renounce the unauthorized messages publicly, apologizing for inadvertently bombarding their friends. These messages — one might call them Tweets of shame — convey a distinct mix of guilt, regret and embarrassment.

“I have been hacked; taking evasive maneuvers. Much apology, my friends,” wrote Rocky Barbanica, a producer for Rackspace Hosting, an Internet storage firm, in one such note.

Mr. Barbanica sent that out last month after realizing he had sent messages to 250 Twitter followers with a link and the sentence, “Are you in this picture?” If they clicked, their Twitter accounts were similarly commandeered.

“I took it personally, which I shouldn’t have, but that’s the natural feeling. It’s insulting,” he said.

Earlier malicious programs could also cause a similar measure of embarrassment if they spread themselves through a person’s e-mail address book.

But those messages, traveling from computer to computer, were more likely to be stopped by antivirus or firewall software. On the Web, such measures offer little protection. (Although they are popularly referred to as viruses or worms, the new forms of Web-based malicious programs do not technically fall into those categories, as they are not self-contained programs.)

Getting tangled up in a virus on a social network is also more painfully, and instantaneously, public. “Once it’s delivered to everyone in three seconds, the cat is out of the bag,” said Chet Wisniewski of Sophos, a Web security firm. “When people got viruses on their computers, or fell for scams at home, they were generally the only ones that knew about it and they cleaned it up themselves. It wasn’t broadcast to the whole world.”

Social networks have become prime targets of such programs’ creators for good reason, security experts say. People implicitly trust the messages they receive from friends, and are inclined to overlook the fact that, say, their cousin from Ohio is extremely unlikely to have caught them on a hidden webcam.

Sophos says that 21 percent of Web users report that they have been a target of malicious programs on social networks. Kaspersky Labs, a Russian security firm, says that on some days, one in 500 links on Twitter point to bad sites that can infect an inadequately protected computer with typical viruses that jam hard drives. Kaspersky says many more links are purely spam, frequently leading to dating sites that pay referral fees for traffic.

A worm that spread around Facebook recently featured a photo of a sparsely dressed woman and offered a link to “see more.” Adi Av, a computer developer in Ashkelon, Israel, encountered the image on the Facebook page of a friend he considered to be a reliable source of amusing Internet content.

A couple of clicks later, the image was posted on Mr. Av’s Facebook profile and sent to the “news feed” of his 350 friends.

“It’s an honest mistake,” he said. “The main embarrassment was from the possibility of other people getting into the same trouble from my profile page.”

Others confess to experiencing a more serious discomfiture.

“You feel like a total idiot,” said Jodi Chapman, who last month unwisely clicked on a Twitter message from a fellow vegan, suggesting that she take an online intelligence test.

Ms. Chapman, who sells environmentally friendly gifts with her husband, uses her Twitter account to communicate with thousands of her company’s customers. The hijacking “filled me with a sense of panic,” she said. “I was so worried that I had somehow tainted our company name by asking people to check their I.Q. scores.”

Social networking attacks do not spare the experts. Two weeks ago, Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet and American Life Project, a nonprofit research group, accidentally sent messages to dozens of his Twitter followers with a link and the line, “Hi, is this you? LOL.” He said a few people actually clicked.

“I’m worried that people will think I communicate this way,” Mr. Rainie said. “ ‘LOL,’ as my children would tell you, is not the style that I want to engage the world with.”




Tags: Antivirus software, Computer virus, facebook, Google, Kaspersky Lab, Malware, malware 2.0, Online Communities, San Francisco, Security, Social network, Social network service, Spyware, Twitter


Nov 13 2009

Cyber criminals deface 50 to 60 Indian websites a day

Category: CybercrimeDISC @ 2:52 pm

microsoft_fr_hacked
Image by Clopin via Flickr

Webnewwire.com report submitted on November 11, 2009

Has your girlfriend blocked you and you cant see her on-line? Wondering how to keep your email account protected? Or want to hide files from your annoying siblings? MTV’s got Ankit Fadia – the coolest Ethical Hacker in the world to give you everything from tips, tricks to cheat codes that will help make your life on the world wide web a whole lot simpler. Learn cool stuff that you can with your computers, Internet, mobile and other technology in your life!

This is India’s first tech show which does not review tech gadgets, websites or software instead it gives viewers a low down (or download!) on cool stuff that they can do with technology that will make their every day life cooler, simpler and stylish!

I am hosting “MTV What the Hack!” show with MTV VJ Jose, informed Ankit Fadia who was in city on a private visit. Watch it on MTV India every Saturday @ 8:20 PM. Repeat Telecasts every day, he appealed to the people

The show is a guy show with lots of typical MTV style humour. VJ Jose and Ankit Fadia shoot the episodes without a script and just naturally jam in front of camera and talk about technology. The show has got a very good response so far as it is being different from other shows. Most of the tech shows in India are review based shows where gadgets, software and websites are reviewed. This is the India’s first reach show that actually teaches viewers something. The show is on as part of MTV’s move to beyond music and beyond television. Since October 17 this year dropped ‘Music Television’ baseline which has been there in India for the past 13 years. Music contributes about 40 per cent of its programming and soon will go down to 25 per cent. This is happening as part of repositioning exercise MTV kicked off two years back. MTV is born of music, inspired by music, driven by music –but not limited by music. IT is now about new ideas, new formats, new ways of reaching people in new places they choose to live in.

Addressing the press conference Ankit Fadia spoke on various issues concerning Cyber Security in India. Speaking about Cyber security issues India is facing today he said Pakistani cyber criminals are able to deface 50 to 60 Indian websites a day, but, in retaliation only 10 to 15 Pakistani websites are defaced. And this has been going on since 2001. Nodoubt, India is IT capital of the world, but, as far as security is concerned India is far lagging behind, informed Ankit.

Speaking further he added that Terrorists are using most advanced technologies for communication. Which include mainly VOIP(Voice Over Internet Protocol) Chats, hiding messages inside photographs, draft emails, encrypted pen drives etc are some of the techniques to communicate with each other, he informed.

Cyber laws in India are quite good, b ut the problem is that the police who enforce those laws are ill equipped and are not trained properly. And he challenged media to visit the nearest police station and lodge a cyber crime complaint. And you will shocked that 9 out of 10 times, the officials attending you won’t follow what you are saying, said Ankit.

The biggest problem that the police worldwide face while solving cyber crime is the fact that the Internet has no boundaries, however, while investigating a cyber crime case a number of geographical, political, social and diplomatic boundaries come into the picture.

The next big security threat could be from Social Networking, Ankit declared. Everybody in India is on the social networking bandwagon. Even Karan Johar, Priyanka Chopra, Aishwarya Rai, Shashi Tharoor, Barack Obama and many other celebrities are updating Twitter daily. The latest viruses, worms, spyware and malware spread through social networking websites like Twitter, Facebook, Orkut and Myspace.

You will receive a private message from one of your friend (who is already infected) containing a link to a Youtube video. Halfway through the video, it will prompt you to download some Video Plugin or Code. Since the message came from your friend, most people tend to trust it and get infected!, said Ankit.

There are many financial scams and frauds happening on social networking websites. Get rich quick schemes, Earn Money Online Scams and various money laundering attacks now come to you through a Twitter update or a Facebook wall post!. Since Social Networking websites are all about your friends, many people are susceptible to the attack, Ankit said and added that Antivirus companies need to gear up to have a social networking aspect to them. People need to be made aware of the threats of social networking!

Another next big security threat could be People Hacking, he informed. People Hacking is all about sweet talking people to get things done. Especially things that they would normally don’t do or should not do!. People Hacking happens around us all the time. In the office, with your friends, at the check in counters at the airport or on the phone with the call centre. To carry out People Hacking you need to know what to say to whom and more importantly how to say it. Inducing fear, guilt, sympathy or just overpowering the victim with your words can lead to People Hacking, informed Ankit Fadia.

When asked about advise like Dos and Don’ts for average internet user he listed out the following.

– Use an Antivirus. More importantly, update it every week.

– Use an Anti Spyware. Update it every week.

– Use a Firewall. They are not as technical as they sound. A very good firewall that I recommend is Zone Alarm. Just do a Google search to download it.

– Use a strong password for all your accounts—a combination of alphabets, numbers and special characters. Use both lowercase and uppercase.

– Use Windows Update every fortnight to patch Windows.

– Use a Key Scrambler—a software the scrambles your keys in such a way that key loggers & other spying tools cant record what you type on your computer.

– Use a password on your Wi Fi network.

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Tags: Aishwarya Rai, Ankit Fadia, Barack Obama, cyber security, facebook, Google, MySpace, pakistan, Priyanka Chopra, Security, social engineering, Social Networking, Twitter, World Wide Web, YouTube


Nov 10 2009

Facebook, MySpace users hit by cyber attacks

Category: CybercrimeDISC @ 1:27 am

facebook
Image by sitmonkeysupreme via Flickr

NZ HERALD reported that Facebook users – already being targeted in a malware campaign – are now under threat from a phishing scam.

Security specialists Symantec report that the company’s systems have picked up fake messages that appear to be sent by the social networking service.

Users will receive an email that looks like an official Facebook invite or a password reset confirmation.

If a duped user clicks on the ‘update’ button they will be redirected a fake Facebook site. They will then be asked to enter a password to complete the updating process.

As soon as the unwitting Facebook user does this, their password is in the hands of cybercriminals.

Dodgy subject lines for the phishing emails are: ‘Facebook account update,’ New login system’ or ‘Facebook update tool’.

The malware campaign that is still targeting Facebook is also propagated via email. This time, the message looks like a Facebook notification that the recipient’s password has been reset.

It includes a zip file that, if opened, launches an .exe file, which Symantec’s Security Response centre says is a net nasty called Trojan.Bredolab.

Once a users’ machine is infected by this malware, it secretly dials back to a Russian domain and, Symantec says, “is most likely becoming part of a Bredolab botnet.”

But it isn’t just Facebook that is being lined up by cybercriminals, News Corp’s MySpace is also under attack.

Potentially dangerous email subject lines to look out for are: ‘Myspace Password Reset Confirmation,’ ‘Myspace office on fire’ and ‘Myspace was ruined’.

Symantec believes their will be another attack on MySpace in the next day or two. “We also think that social networking sites with huge user bases are currently being targeted to infect maximum machines or gather passwords for more malicious activities in future,” the security team said in a statement.

It advised users to be extra-careful of suspicious attachments, especially those including password reset requests. Legitimate websites will not send an attachment for resetting a password, it said.

– NZ HERALD STAFF

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Tags: botnet, facebook, Malware, MySpace, News Corporation, phishing, Social network, Social network service, trojan, Website


Apr 15 2009

Growing social networks and widening threats

Category: Information Privacy,MalwareDISC @ 2:08 am

Jump on the social media bandwagon
Image by Matt Hamm via Flickr
The worm targeted a social network Twitter with four attacks and created havoc for couple of days. This worm happens to self replicated itself when clicked on but didn’t steal 6 million users personal information.
According to SF chronicle article by Michael Liedtke (Apr. 14 2009, c2) Twitter deleted 10,000 tweets after a worm makes a squirm.

“The worm was intended to promote a Twitter knock off, StalkDaily.com. It displayed unwanted messages on infected Twitter accounts, urging people to visit the website.”

With all the resources of a big company Twitter was unable to quarantine the worm and the only way to get rid of the worm was to delete 10,000 Twitter messages, known tweets. The social network growth is widening the threats and making an inviting target for hackers and scam artist with a treasure trove of personal information. People personal and in some cases private information is up for grab unless we enact policy protections against these scam artists to pursue legal action.

How to clean Twitter worm “StalkDaily” aka “Mikeyy”

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Tags: facebook, San Francisco Chronicle, Social network, Twitter


Mar 20 2009

Web 2.0 and social media business risks

Category: Web 2.0DISC @ 3:01 am

A tag cloud with terms related to Web 2.

Web 2.0 is major force and has numerous business benefits but it is posing companies to potential new risks.
Social networking sites, such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, have become the preferred method of communication for a whole generation of people and the ability to post “Status Updates” is fast becoming the new Email. Linkedin is adding one user per second and Facebook has reached 150 million users in just five years.

Some of the associated risks which organizations face as a result relate to phishing, harvesting of email addresses and of course the dangers of (relatively) simple social networking, not only to hack the employee’s present organization, say, but to the organization of losing an employee and all their leads because clients follow ‘their man/woman’ to their new job by tracing where they are at through sites such as LinkedIn. Hackers can follow the conversation on social media to identify the user problem or pain point and pretend to offer a solution which happen to be a malware to steal private and confidential data.

And then of course there is the downside of staff using bandwidth and their work time for purposes other than for which they are employed, and possibly preventing others (due to bandwidth/processing restrictions) from doing what they should. Many of these sites openly encourage people to download video clips.

The solution?
Usually the controls in ISO 27002 code of practice can be selected and applied in a manner to address the associated risks through a combination of management and technical policies, but of course this should be as the result of a risk assessment and should balance the three attributes of C, I and A.

Web-20

For clear best practice guidance on how to tackle ‘Threat 2.0’, you should download
Web 2.0: Trends, benefits and risks!




This 112-page best practice report from IT Governance separates the hype from the tangible reality and provides:


1. A workable description of what ‘Web 2.0’ is and what it means, within the business environment, complete with a glossary of Web 2.0 terms.
2. A description of the business benefits to be derived from Web 2.0 technologies, with examples taken from real-life case studies.
3. An identification and discussion of ‘Threat 2.0’ – the information security risks inherent in Web 2.0 technologies, together with latest best-practice recommendations for mitigation.

During financial crisis when companies are cutting budgets. It is imperative that information security will have some budget cut but any drastic budget cut might not be wise. A major security breach might put the organization in irrecoverable situation. In this tough economy security professionals have to do an extraordinary job to sell the security to management and show them how security due diligence can make business safe, successful and compliant.

Do you think the advantages of social media outweigh the potential risks?

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Tags: facebook, iso 27002, linkedin, Security, Social network, Social network service, Twitter, Video clip, Web 2.0


Oct 21 2008

12 Phishing Threats and Identity Theft

Category: Email Security,Identity TheftDISC @ 7:22 pm

Have you ever thought of losing something and you cannot live without it? Yes, that something can be your identity. Phishing is a practice of luring unsuspecting Internet users to a fake Web site by using authentic-looking email with the real organization’s logo, in an attempt to steal passwords, financial or personal information. In daily life people advise to retrace your steps when you lose something. The question is how you retrace your steps on cyberspace where some uber hackers know how to erase their footsteps to avoid detection. It is difficult to find phishers in cyberspace, and jurisdictional issues make it even harder to prosecute them. Then there is an issue of trust that phishers dupe people to believe that their web site is not fraudulent to collect personal/financial information.

Amongst the financial crisis, phishing might be on the rise because for many organizations information protection might be the last thing on their mind. The FDIC has created a webpage to inform and warn consumers about “phishing.” These days phishers have targeted social network organizations LinkedIn and Facebook where their members have been duped into revealing their sensitive data.

Mainly phishing attacks are targeted to steal the identity. Now the question is, how easy it is to steal somebody’s identity? Let’s say a phisher has your name and address, and then he/she can get your Social Security number with the search on AccurInt or other personal database website. A Social Security number is not the only bounty a fraudster can find on these websites, other personal/private information is available as well at minimal cost.

In the table below are the 12 threats to your online identity which can be manipulated in phishing scams, and possible countermeasures to protect your personal and financial information. Some threats are inadequate or no security controls in place. The last row of the table is a monitoring control to identify the warning signs of identity theft.

[Table=7]

Organizations should take necessary steps to protect against identity fraud and apply whatever state and federal legislation applies to your business. Organizations which are serious about their information security should consider implementing the ISO 27001 (ISMS) standard as a best practice, which provides reasonable due diligence to protect and safeguard your information.

US Bank phishing attack exposed
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2QKQkuSB4Q


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Tags: accurint, countermeasure, cyberspace, due diligence, equifax, experian, facebook, fdic, financial crisis, fraudster, identity fraud, information protection, isms, iso 27001, jurisdictional, legislation, linkedin, phishing, prosecute, safeguard, social security, threats, transunion, uber hacker