Instant messenger (IM) attacks are on the rise with cyber criminals aiming their attacks at compromising legitimate IM accounts. According to Symantec researchers, the threats will largely be comprised of unsolicited spam messages containing malicious links to infected websites.
The driving force behind the expected rise, the researchers say, is the improvement of CAPTCHA technology which will prompt more businesses in emerging economies to employ people to manually generate accounts on legitimate websites, especially those supporting user-generated content, for spamming purposes.
CAPTCHAs can be used to prevent automated software from performing actions which degrade the quality of service of a given system, whether due to abuse or resource expenditure. They can be deployed to protect systems vulnerable to e-mail spam, such as the webmail services of Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo! Mail.
“By the end of 2010, Symantec predicts that one in 300 IM messages will contain a URL. Also, in 2010, Symantec predicts that over-all, one in 12 hyperlinks will be linked to a domain known to be used for hosting malware. Thus, one in 12 hyperlinks appearing in IM messages will contain a domain that has been considered suspicious or malicious. In mid 2009, that level was one in 78 hyperlinks,” the researchers say.
These are scary statistics and it would not be unreasonable to expect a spike in such activity around the 2010 World Cup, which is being hosted in South Africa, one of the world’s leading emerging economies.
The influx of football fans for the tournament -many of who make use of instant messaging, coupled with rising international interest in the event, could make the country an ideal staging post for such criminal IM activity. 2010netthreat.com will keep you posted.