Dear College of Education,

As millions of shoppers begin looking for great deals this holiday season, the Education IT team wants to remind everyone to be on the lookout for scams, phishing schemes, and malware.  Below are a couple of articles that touch on the subject.   Be alert and have a restful and enjoyable holiday season!

–Education IT

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Cyber Monday: Beware the malware

http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-20023728-245.html

Holiday Season Phishing Scams and Malware Campaigns

http://www.us-cert.gov/current

added to us-cert.gov on November 18, 2010 at 02:17 pm

In the past, US-CERT has received reports of an increased number of phishing scams and malware campaigns that take advantage of the winter holiday and holiday shopping season. US-CERT reminds users to remain cautious when receiving unsolicited email messages that could be part of a potential phishing scam or malware campaign.

These phishing scams and malware campaigns may include but are not limited to the following:

• electronic greeting cards that may contain malware
• requests for charitable contributions that may be phishing scams and may originate from illegitimate sources claiming to be charities
• screensavers or other forms of media that may contain malware
• credit card applications that may be phishing scams or identity theft attempts
• online shopping advertisements that may be phishing scams or identity theft attempts from bogus retailers

US-CERT encourages users and administrators to use caution when encountering these types of email messages and take the following preventative measures to protect themselves from phishing scams and malware campaigns:

• Do not follow unsolicited web links in email messages.
• Use caution when opening email attachments. Refer to the Using Caution with Email Attachments Cyber Security Tip for more information on safely handling email attachments.
• Maintain up-to-date antivirus software.
• Review the Federal Trade Commission’s Charity Checklist.
• Verify charity authenticity through a trusted contact number. Trusted contact information can be found on the Better Business Bureau National Charity Report Index.
• Refer to the Recognizing and Avoiding Email Scams (pdf) document for more information on avoiding email scams.
• Refer to the Avoiding Social Engineering and Phishing Attacks Cyber Security Tip for more information on social engineering attacks.
• Refer to the Shopping Safely Online Cyber Security Tip for more information on online shopping safety.

See:  http://www.us-cert.gov/current

Computer viruses can be anywhere and infect our machines with just a single click of the mouse.  Using traditional Anti-Virus programs and guidelines (such as not opening strange emails, etc.) certainly help keep us protected.  However, a new threat has emerged that is particularly tricky: Antivirus 2010.        

Even though it claims to be good software, Antivirus 2010 is malware!!!        

Antivirus 2010 comes in many varieties, but they all have the same basic components.  The virus spreads via infected websites, and sometimes the only way to tell if a website is infected is when the virus tries to infect your machine.  The way it tries to install itself is very clever…     

The first thing that happens is that a screen will pop up saying that you are infected with a virus.  Typically, it looks something like this: