Obama’s win results in new malware attack

Barack Obama’s election as the 44th president of the United States has spawned a new malware attack.  Scammers wasted no time sending out e-mails with links to a video of the victory speech he gave the night of the election.  The link takes the user to a site called America.gov, and like many malicious spams before it, produces a pop up claiming Adobe Flash must be updated in order for the video to run.  The download is, of course, malware which steals personal info and sends it to a host machine run by the scammers.

Another version of the attack claims to come from a Spanish news site and has a video actually embedded in the e-mail.  Clicking on it prompts a download called “BarackObama.exe” and if run it sets up a direct link between the PC and the scammers.  Experts are particularly worried about this variation as it is not detected by anti-virus software.

While the subject of malicious spam messages changes often, the payload is always the same—malware.  Scammers are always exploiting the headlines because they know many people can’t resist a lurid headline.  It’s the same reason supermarket tabloids and celebrity gossip mags are so popular.  To protect yourself, don’t click on links in e-mails, don’t download files from sites you’re not familiar with, and if an e-mail sound suspicious, don’t even bother to open it, just hit delete.  Also, make sure your browser is equipped with a good pop-up blocker and use one that has built-in tools that detect and block malicious sites.