Scareware slingers flaunt fake MS endorsement
Black-hat scripting malfeasance
Scareware wronguns have developed a neat but evil piece of coding trickery designed to dupe prospective marks into believing that Microsoft is endorsing their worthless scamware.
A rogue anti-malware product called DefenceLab redirects infected PCs to Microsoft's Support portal, but modifies the HTML content as it returns so as to appear as if Microsoft is endorsing the worthless software. The ploy, which follows a fake scan and bogus Windows Security Center alert, is designed to persuade Windows users already exposed to infection by agents of the scareware package to pay for a full version of the supposed clean-up utility.
Surfers visiting the URL on the Windows Support site referenced in the scareware from a clean PC will get a 404 'page not found' message. Hacked PC victims will see an apparent endorsement.
Screenshots of the attack in action can be found in a blog post by anti-spyware firm Sunbelt Software, which was the first to warn of the threat, here.
The ruse is a development of earlier trickery that involved hacking the hosts' file on compromised computers in order to hijack web surfing sessions. An earlier attack using this technique redirected Microsoft queries to a hacked UK-based computer, as explained in a blog posting by AVG's Roger Thompson here. ®
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COMMENTS
Oh shut up!
The scammers are getting more clever, they no longer need to infect machines, they simply find ways to fool their marks into bouncing to dicky websites and pulling down the goods, through shite bolt-ons likes Flash, Javascript and dicky JPG and PDF files. The base libraries that read those technologies are usually the same the world over. As Apple makes more market penetration, those fancy metrosexual fanbois and their high-incomes are going to be too rich a prize to resist for the Lads from Lagos!
The Mac has security through blinkers and ear muffs! "La! La! La! I can't get infected! La! La! La! I'm perfectly free from Windows viruses!". Yep, well that still leaves the gaping great plank behind the keyboard and there's no AV for that my friend!
Here's the kicker.
Now how about I tell you I own 5 Apple machines and no Windows kit, but after 25 years IT I am not so arrogant to believe that just 'cos Steve "The Saviour" Jobs says it safe, it is, 'cos it ain't! OK? The Mac has security issues, just like Linux does, just liek BSD does, just like Billy's toy O/S does.
As Apple makes more converts from Windows and Apple seem care less and less about security, I genuinely fear for the safety of my OSX systems. I am investing time in learning to harden Linux, 'cos when that first worm/virus appears and Apple machines are falling that bowling pins, I'll be laughing at the fanbois!
and the real question is...
how long it takes a mac or linux user to slip past the hubris detectors and make some smug, semi-honest but utterly worthless comment here...
Quite an interesting story though, I wonder if we'll get any stats at a later date about how many systems are compromised by this.
I'd be interested to know just what percentage of the general public are stupid enough to fall for this.
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