LinkScanner Press Releases

Hacker Scheme for Buying Search Keywords
ComputerWorld - A hacker scheme for buying search keywords on Google and then routing users to a malicious site when they clicked on sponsored links was revealed Wednesday April 25, by Roger Thompson, chief technology officer at Exploit Prevention Labs.

Source:

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9017862&intsrc=hm_list  

The rest of the story is that not only the sponsored links are at risk. The same risks are common in all search engines’ natural results. This is the justification for including LinkScanner in your Layered Security Solution, especially if you surf the Internet.

Google AdWords Falls Victim to Cyber Criminals
Researchers at security software developer Exploit Prevention Labs have uncovered hard evidence that cybercriminals are using Google AdWords to infect unsuspecting users with malware. Under the guise of ads for legitimate, trusted organizations like The Better Business Bureau (see screen shot), unsuspecting users are instead redirected to malicious sites that attempt to install exploits and other malware. Exploit Prevention Labs first learned of this new attack vector April 10 when a LinkScanner Pro user ran a Google search on the phrase "how to start a business". The top-ranked sponsored search listing appeared to be from AllBusiness.com, a legitimate business, yet the hyperlink actually led to a site that attempted to install a password-stealing keylogger on the user's PC. LinkScanner Pro blocked the threat and automatically reported the discovery back to Exploit Prevention Labs researchers, who launched an immediate investigation. Read more.

Exploit Prevention Labs Releases March Exploit Prevalence Survey
Exploit Prevention Labs, the leading developer of safe surfing software for protection against web-based exploits, today released findings for its March 2007 Exploit Prevalence Survey™. March’s most notable development occurred toward the end of the month, on March 28, when a zero-day exploit that takes advantage of how Windows handles animated cursor (.ani) files was discovered. The so-called ANI exploit attacked fully patched Windows XP SP2 machines running IE 6 or 7 and was successful enough to land the number four slot on the prevalence survey with only four days of distribution. Read more.

Exploit Prevention Labs Releases February Exploit Prevalence Survey
Exploit Prevention Labs, the leading developer of safe surfing software for protection against web-based exploits, today released findings for its February 2007 Exploit Prevalence Survey™. Roger Thompson, CTO of Exploit Prevention Labs and author of the monthly Exploit Prevalence Survey, noted steady activity among cybercriminals in February. For the third consecutive month, the Q406 Roll-up exploit package captured the survey’s number one spot with 35.17 percent of all occurrences. Read more.

Exploit Prevention Labs Protects MySpace Users Against Ad-based exploits
Users of MySpace, the popular social networking site, have joined the ranks of unwitting victims of cybercriminals using banner ads to distribute vulnerability exploits. If their PCs had been protected by Exploit Prevention Labs’ SocketShield, this would not have been the case.
Read more.