Computer Safety Tip

Cybercrime and the part cybercriminals have to play in the malware war…

April 2, 2010 Computer News

This particular article is my second take on Cybercrime and the criminals that accompany this malicious type of enterprise.

Yesterday, I dove ever so slightly into the workings of the cybercriminals’ mind, and how exactly it is that these cybercriminals get weir kicks – or should I say millions of dollars.

One cannot go further – without highlighting the exact occurrences of cybercrime, and how one can actually prevent yourself from becoming a cybercrime statistic.

Cyber crime is being propagated by the fact that cybercriminals are leveraging new technologies, as well as reinventing social engineering forms, so as to coerce and entrap consumers.
Due to this very fact, the last six months has seen an increase in Web threats, and a steady decrease in Adware and Spyware, as a combating force, as these types have outdated technical methods, and cannot compete with the high-level security of the newer malware.

Phishing techniques

While Nigerian phishing scam and the Spanish prisoner scams have been around for quite some time now, cybercriminals are continually refreshing and modernizing this standard form of trickery. A recent example, according to Trend Micro (a global leader in Internet content security), “a new form of phishing warned potential victims about phishing emails as a way to legitimize that email and then tricked them into clicking on a link that leads to a fraudulent site”.

Developing Malware

It has recently been discovered that profit-motivated Web threats blend various malicious software components into a singular Web threat business model. An example of this would be when a cyber criminal sends a message (spam) with an embedded link in the email (also known as a malicious URL) or contained in an instant message. The user clicks on the link and is redirected to a Web site where a file (Trojan) automatically downloads onto the user’s computer. The Trojan then downloads an additional file (spyware) that captures sensitive information, such as bank account numbers (spy-phishing). All of which is extremely dangerous for any PC user.
Six-Month forecast
According to Trend micro – the following forecasts are predicted:

Social engineering will remain a key attack method, with more sophisticated tricks continually evolving. Trend Micro expects cyber criminals to leverage events such as the Summer Olympics, back-to -school shopping, the U.S. election season, soccer and football events, and the holiday season in December.

• Cybercriminals will continue to target newly discovered vulnerabilities in “third-party” software applications, such as QuickTime, RealPlayer, Adobe Flash, etc.
• Crimeware that relies on technical methods that are becoming obsolete, such as dialers and keyloggers, will continue to slowly decline in number. Grayware such as trackware and browser hijackers will also slowly fall off in number as they cannot scale well in an era of million-member botnets.
• Spam volume will continue to rise exponentially with average daily spam volumes predicted to increase by 30- to 50- billion messages per day. Spam and phishing will rise in August to correspond with back-to-school activities and the Olympics. A seasonal spike is also expected in November to correspond with the holidays, with spam forecasted to reach 170 to 180 billion messages per day.
• As is occurring now, both spam and phishing will continue to play a part in blended threats. About 0.2 percent-one out of every 500 Web requests-are sent to Web sites hosted on infected PCs, and this trend is expected to continue.

Bots and Botnet’s will continue to play an important part in the threat chain for spamming, information stealing, targeted attacks and large-scale attack campaigns.

Let’s not fall victim to these cyber thugs – instead – let us educate ourselves – research and do more research – until we have found a clear understanding of how and why cybercrime has become so evidently rampant in this the digital era.

Tags: Adware, cybercrime, cybercriminal, millions of dollars, new technologies, scams, spyware