It used to be coal if you weren’t nice … but Malware ??
Websense Security Labs™ ThreatSeeker™ Network has discovered that the Koobface Web site offers a video posted by ‘SantA’. The usual ruse of requiring a codec to watch the video is used to encourage the user to install and run a file that is, you guessed it, malware.
This malicioius file is currently detected by less than 40% of the available antivirus products according to VirusTotal
On the compromised Facebook page the user is presented with a link to a compromised site in Switzerland. The user is redirected to one of several Koobface Web sites through a malicious Flash movie file hosted on the compromised site. If the user runs the infected file, the worm will automatically login to their Facebook, Myspace, and several other social networking sites and send messages to all their friends.
See screenshot of the malicious wall posts here.
My advice… make sure you have the right technology that prevents you from connecting to this and other infected sites using various ‘lures’… and in this case … Santa !!
Web 2.0 — the emerging social media world populated by entities like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace — represents the greatest danger in a sea of threats for 2010 … Read the rest of the security trends for 2010 on eChannelline.
I recently attended a customer event where I presented a short overview of the Web 2.0 at Work study released by Websense.
Just to ensure everyone was on the same page with respect to what Web 2.0 was… I started by asking the audience for their definition of Web 2.0.
Although only a few were brave enough to respond, just as when I ask about DLP, each one had a different definition… ranging from the generic ‘social networks’ to technical references such as ’Ajax’. We finally agreed upon the common denominator of ‘user generated content’.
Even though I felt like that kid in Jerry Maguire having the ‘did you know?’ conversation, it was interesting to see the reactions of each attendee once presented with some of the facts and stats on the prevelance of Web 2.0 and the security misconceptions.
Needless to say, the dialogue following my breakfast presentation was dominated by…’ I didn’t realize that !” or ‘if I could do that, that would solve …’
Most if not all of the attendees knew that they needed an update in their security posture, but were unaware of how to address this shift from a technology perspective.
If are trying to figure out how to provide safe and secure access to sites like Facebook, Linkedin and others social media / web 2.0 sites, I recommend the following Best Practices document.
Web 2.0 is here to stay – we just need to adapt our security infrastructure and policies to better address it.
This highlights the ‘other’ side of Web 2.0 and the sometimes negative aspect of user generated content…
Websense Security Labs has seen an increase of over 300 per cent in the first five months of 2009 the number of sites it categorizes as containing “racism and hate” and “militancy and extremist” over the same period in 2008. The content was particularly prevelant on Web 2.0 sites such as Facebook.
The rise in this category of sites potentially forces businesses to reevaluate their policies on allowing Web 2.0 sites to be used at work.
A Websense survey of 1,300 IT managers in 10 countries showed that although 95 per cent of IT managers allow access to Web 2.0 in some way, only nine per cent have security to protect all threats. The statistic becomes troublesome considering the survey also found that 62 per cent of IT managers believe Web 2.0 is necessary for their business.
Part of the trouble with Web 2.0 is correctly identifying the kinds of sites that it encompasses. The same Websense survey showed that only 17 per cent of IT manger correctly identified all types of Web 2.0 sites from a list. Half of these IT managers identified wikis, video uploading and cloud computing to be Web 2.0.
