Cyber criminals employ persuasive online scare tactics: study
Indian Express: Cyber criminals are employing increasingly persuasive online scare tactics to convince users to purchase rogue security software, according to a study conducted by Symantec.
Rogue security software or scareware, is a software that pretends to be legitimate security software. These rogue applications provide little or no value and may even install malicious code or reduce the overall security of the computer.
“The Internet infrastructure in India is growing rapidly and we are witnessing a burgeoning broadband population. As a direct consequence, an industry study has estimated India to have the second highest online shopping turnover by 2010,” said Shantanu Ghosh, vice president, India Product Operations, Symantec.
“In such a scenario, the presence of scareware is an impending concern that will critically affect Indian consumers and enterprises alike.”
The study’s findings are based on data obtained between July 2008 and June 2009.
To encourage unsuspecting users to install their rogue software, cyber criminals place website ads that prey on users’ fears of security threats. These ads typically include false claims such as “if this ad is flashing, your computer may be at risk or infected,” urging the user to follow a link to scan their computer or get software to remove the threat.
According to the study, 93 per cent of the software installations for the top 50 rogue security software scams were intentionally downloaded by the user.
As of June 2009, Symantec has detected more than 250 distinct rogue security software programs.
The initial monetary loss to consumers who downloaded these rogue products ranges from $30 to $100.
Not only can these rogue security programs cheat the user out of money, but the personal details and credit card information provided during the purchase can be used in additional fraud or sold on black market forums resulting in identify theft.
To make matters worse, some rogue security software actually installs malicious code that puts users at risk of attack from additional threats. As a result, installing these programs can lower the security posture of a computer while claiming to strengthen it.
For example, rogue programs may instruct the user to lower or disable any existing security settings while registering the bogus software or prevent the user from accessing legitimate security websites after installation.
This, in turn, leaves users exposed to the very threats the rogue software promised to protect against.
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