Category: Social

Computer Security : important caveat not all websites are safe

Paul

Everyday we’ve seen people get infections on there systems and most don’t understand that they’ve been duped and have installed the software themselves.

In this article we will talk about how most people will willingly install these Trojans and virus themselves for several different reasons.

ineluctable truth about Human Nature

These malware authors know all about how people think.    It usually happens when people think they are seeing something provocative and something you can watch in your private homes.   There are several different ways to do this:

  • News stories —  Alas this is always being used to spread malware.   For example Erin Andrews Peephole malware.

  • Fake photos files — This is also a very common ploy, to make people think it is a Photo but in reality it is an Executable.  Example : MichealJackson.JPG.EXE

  • Fake Codecs — You visit what you think is a popular movie and it says you need to install a codec.  This is another way for people to get infected with a Trojan, or a Virus.   For example : [intlink id=”3739″ type=”post”]Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince malware[/intlink].

  • Fake PDF’s —  There have been known exploits in the Adobe Reader and Adobe where a malware author can take control over the pc and install whatever they want into the system.  Example : Attackers Target New Adobe Flash/Reader Flaw

As you can see these are just a few but have been used in the past so it doesn’t mean they won’t be used in the future.   The Malware authors will also use Social sites to infect your pc, Here are a few common ones:

  • You get a message that states “[intlink id=”3662″ type=”post”]Look at this[/intlink]” Most of the twitter users were very curious and had not seen alot of malware on twitter and was very trusting, so they would willingly go to these sites not expecting to get a trojan or virus.

  • You get a message in face book “You look just awesome in this video.”  You try to go to the URL and it says You have to update your flash player.   This is another common way to get the user to install a trojan or virus and think it is a legitimate update.

  • Twitter Spambots —  You get a message about a Registry cleaner but it is a rogue Antivurs.  You down load this software and without thinking run it and your infected.   Twitter and facebook users are to relax to see just how dangerous links can be.

Most or all can be used as email also so you don’t have to be on any site to recieved an attached file with something similar to that you see up there.   You must never download anything you know nothing about and if in doubt scan it with several virus scanners by uploading it to Virustotal that is a good site to see if some well known vendors consider this program or file to be a virus. These were just a few, I am sure I have missed several and will probably hear about this from the users. I encourage people to discuss this and talk about other ways this can happen.

I recommend:
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Facebook : Beware Spam for breakfast. (Virus)

Paul

In today’s society, we’ve been to complacent with people with people clicking links for the social group. In one such article on Channel Web, a nice little blog, says this:

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The worm was discovered by IT security provider Kaspersky Lab, which said the threat, Net-Worm.Win32.Koobface.b, is targeting Facebook users by creating spam messages and sending them to the infected user’s friends via the site.

“Unfortunately, users are very trusting of messages left by ‘friends’ on social networking sites,” said Alexander Gostev, senior virus analyst at Kaspersky Lab, in a statement. “So, the likelihood of a user clicking on a link like this is very high.”


[Via Channel Web]

This seems to be a problem people thinking that a link someone sends them is a real good link but actually is a link to a video site. According to this article the links people are sending are actually a fake video link, telling you have to download some update to flash player, by downloading this program. The user gets involved with the virus and the fun begins. So how can you prevent this from happening, two ways one is a very good group of software to make sure you have the latest and greatest video codecs. That too can be something they’ll say you need and if you’ve already installed this list of codecs then you know they’ll not telling the truth and you can quickly get away from the site laughing.

[ad#ad2-left]What’s this program name, it is call the K-lite Mega Codec pack. In this Pack you will be able to play almost everything without having to go download another program. This is done by people who want you to have all the latest codecs installed so you don’t have to go by a program you’ll only going to use once a month.

Once you’ve done that, you’ll no longer have to worry for the most part about codecs. There will be times when you might have to visit that site and update them but that will be far less.

The other thing you must remember is if it says you must update your player. That should be a sign that there is something. I’ll always go to the site and check for example Adobe. If it says I need to update my flash I’ll manually type it into my browser. This way you will know you have the latest updates, if you need to update the flash player by all means go to here and update.

If you got the virus I’d check out my Anti-virus and Anti-Spyware page and that should show you will you need to get rid of the Virus. This virus is very easy to get rid of, just download any one of the anti-virus software and install it. Don’t forget to update the virus database while your at it. That should fix the problem pretty fast. Remember the only way to prevent from getting the virus is YOU.

GTA 4 Causes fatal error mma10, how to fix it!!

Paul

[ad#ad2-left]After seeing all this happened I thought I would help people out on how to fix it.   This seems to be a DRM problem according to some reports.  Others are thinking it is the Securerom.  Anyways the problem seems to be with the Rockstar Social Club and not to log in to that.  That will fix the problem, you will at least be able to play the single player game.  This is a temporary fix till the developers fix in the update.  This will also fix the Steam version of the game.