The 10 Most Dangerous "Trusted" Sites: Part 1

ChannelWeb came out with a list of the 10 most dangerous legitimate websites to date. As discussed in the previous articles of this month’s newsletter, legitimate sites are now the preferred targets of today’s hackers as they are far more lucrative than the commonly acknowledged dubious sites.

So, without further adieu, here are the 10 sites to be weary of:

1.       Facebook             

With almost 500 million users, Facebook is the ultimate target for cybercriminals. Ever since the Koobface of 2008 (an anagram for Facebook and a virus that is very much alive and thriving today), Facebook has experienced an escalation of attacks. Beware of fraudulent profiles and Facebook log-in pages as they are phishing Malware attacks.

2.       Twitter

Coming in behind Facebook in social networking popularity, Twitter is another favored target for hackers. The most common of Twitter attacks is an infected URL which will download Malware onto the unsuspecting user’s computer. And just like Facebook, Twitter has also been the victim of phishing attacks, prompting users to sign in on a counterfeit log-in page or to click a malicious link in a phony profile.  

3.       Google

As the most popular site on the Internet, Google is constantly under attack. The most popular of these assaults are search engine poisoning techniques to get malicious sites to appear at the top of the search rankings as traditionally users will trust and click on those sites listed first. Gmail is also a victim of phishing scams.

4.       URL Shortening Sites

Thanks to Twitter and its 140 character limit per Tweet URL shortening sites such as TinyURL and Bit.ly have been increasing in popularity, both with legitimate users and hackers. Not only are these sites being targeted by Malware attackers, but the shortened URLs are also a new vehicle for infection as well.

5.       YouTube

For a long time now hackers have been enticing users of YouTube to download malicious content. The most popular way to do this is to hijack an email or social networking account and to then send the infected video codec to all of the victim’s contacts, creating a sense of legitimacy.

Tune in next month for Part 2 of this list!