Malware running rampant on social networks

From SC Magazine (Chuck Miller)

Attackers have discovered that spreading their malware is a much easier task on social networking sites than it is on the rest of the Web. The success rate for malware on social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook is 10 percent, compared with less than one tenth of that on normal sites and through email.

SC Magazine is reporting that malware is now a serious concern on these sites.

In a presentation at the Kuwait ICT Security Forum last week, Stefan Tanase, malware analyst at the EEMEA Research Center, Kaspersky Lab Global Research and Analysis Team, said social networks have a 10 percent success rate in terms of infection compared to less than one percent for malware spread via email.

This has enormous implications for the future of social networking, because the popularity of social networking sites has not been ignored by cybercriminals. Last year, sites such as Facebook and Twitter became hotbeds of malware and spam -- and yet another source of illegal gains on the Internet, Tanase said.

Read the full report here.

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