SOCIAL NETWORKING
Social networking worms: Social
networking worms include Koobface, which has become, according to researchers,
"the largest Web 2.0 botnet."
While a multi-faceted threat like Koobface challenges the definition of
"worm," it is specifically designed to propagate across social
networks (e.g., Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, hi5, Friendster and Bebo), enlist
more machines into its botnet, and
hijack more accounts to send more spam to enlist more machines. All the while
making money with the usual botnet business, including scareware and Russian
dating services.
Phishing bait: Remember FBAction? The e-mail
that lured you to sign into Facebook, hoping you don't pick up on the
fbaction.net URL in the browser? Many Facebook users had their accounts
compromised, and although it was only a "tiny fraction of a percent,"
when you realize Facebook has over 350 million users, it's still a significant
number. To its credit, Facebook acted quickly, working to blacklist that
domain, but lots of copycat efforts ensued (e.g., fbstarter.com).Facebook has
since gotten rather adept at Whack-A-Mole.
Trojans: Social networks have become a
great vector for trojans -- "click here" and you get:* Zeus -- a
potent and popular banking Trojan that has been given new life by social
networks. There have been several recent high-profile thefts blamed on Zeus,
notably the Duanesburg Central School district in New York State late in 2009.*
URL Zone -- is a similar banking Trojan, but even smarter, it can calculate the
value of the victim's accounts to help decide the priority for the thief.
