Hard drive prices may be skyrocketing, but USB keys are almost a dime a dozen these days. Maybe that’s why people lose them so much; apparently, folks drop memory sticks at major rail lines by the literal bucket load. Misplacing all that data doesn’t sound smart, but security vendor Sophos recently tested an auction lot of 50 lost USBs on Sydney railways, and their findings show that losing those sticks may have been a good thing after all – since most of them were riddled with malware.
Success always comes at a cost, and for Google's immensely popular open source Android platform, success has attracted the attention of malware writers. In fact, Android is again the most targeted mobile platform on the planet by malware authors, and during a time when mobile malware growth is at an all-time high, according to McAfee's Third-Quarter Threats Report for 2011.
This the time of year when everyone starts compiling lists of the best and worst holiday gift ideas, what with Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the holiday shopping season all on the horizon. Security firm F-Secure put together its own list, but rather than swing one or the other, the protective folks at F-Secure meshed them all into a single "Top Ten Most 'Dangerous' Holiday Gifts for Cyber Monday 2011."
It’s not uncommon to see a free iPad scam pop up in your Facebook feed, but the latest apparent hack is a little more about shock than profit. An as yet unknown attack appears to be flooding some users’ feeds with images of gore and pornography. Facebook has acknowledged an increase in reports of such content, ans is investigating.
One Russian and six Estonians have been arrested (or have a warrant for their arrest) and charged with wire fraud and conspiracy in a 27-count indictment for allegedly hacking millions of computer systems in more than 100 countries and participating in a "massive" scheme to reroute Web surfers to rogue servers. By doing so, the seven individuals accumulated millions of dollars in fraudulent online ad revenue, the DoJ said.
Malware sucks. In the best-case scenario, it craps up your system with unwanted files and occasionally makes itself known in the form of a persistent pop-up window or annoying browser-based toolbar. In the worst-case scenario, malware completely takes over your desktop or laptop and ruins your life.
Apple's much hyped iPhone press event has brought the Web's worst out of the woodwork (we're talking about hackers, not Apple fanyboys, in case that's not clear) who are trying to get gullible users to click on malicious links. The email appears to come from Apple and seemingly provides details about "the new Apple iPhone 5GS," and that alone is a dead giveaway that something's fishy. Apple 
It sucks, but malicious apps are beginning to be a common occurrence on Android phones. Studies have shown that malware-ridden Android apps have been on a meteoric rise throughout the year. A new report says the havoc is spreading; many of us know better than to click on a link from an untrusted source, but scammers have started working around that by offering scannable QR codes that link directly to malware.
Symantec noticed an uptick in social engineering attacks in September, a trend the security outfit attributes to a rise in polymorphic malware in email, the company said in its recently released "Symantec Intelligence Report: September 2011." Spam levels dipped slightly in September to 74.8 percent of all email, a decrease of 1.1 percent from August, but a "deluge of malicious email-borne malware" more than made up for the drop in spam.
As antivirus programs and end users alike become more adept at identifying badware, malware authors are getting even sneakier in their quest to infect your computer. Social engineering is the name of the game now – just ask the NBC News exec who clicked on an infected Christmas tree attachment from an unknown sender. A new report says that scammers have begun using a novel trick to get users to open malicious files; they send emails that claim to be from the office’s printer/scanner, which is actually pretty friggin’ clever.
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