James Delahunty
2 Oct 2007 4:49
Now that computer users are more wise to email-delivered spam and other conventional methods in use to deliver Malware to unsuspecting or naive users, malicious software authors are looking for newer ways to fool us all. One of its prime goals now is to deliver Malware by exploiting the huge demand for video content online. You might have already noticed some spam emails use HTML links to fool users into thinking they are clicking on YouTube links (usually claiming they are recordings of the user that another individual uploaded).
The Georgia Tech Information Security Center has released a report on Internet threats as it is holding its its annual summit. The summit has gathered over 300 scholars and security experts to discuss emerging threats for 2008 and how they may be fought off. "Just as we see an evolution in messaging, we also see an evolution in threats," said Chris Rouland, the chief technology officer for IBM Corp.'s Internet Security Systems
Rouland added: "As companies have gotten better blocking e-mails, we see people move to more creative techniques." Rouland said in the report that the, "next logical step seems to be media players". There have been a few cases so far that have involved video content, like a worm found in 2006 that launches a corrupt Web site without prompting after a user opens a media file in a player.
"People are accustomed to not clicking on messages from banks, but they all want to see videos from YouTube," Rouland said. While anti-spam filters constantly improve in blocking known spam sites and cleaning email accounts of spam, security researchers will have to come up with effective methods to defend users as the demand for multimedia content delivered through the net continues to explode.
Source:
Yahoo (AP)