Mobile banking goldmine for cybercriminals
Mobile banking goldmine for
cybercriminals
AUCKLAND and AMSTERDAM – 9 November 2012 – Consumers who use their smartphones to access online banking services are among the latest targets for cybercriminals, according to the AVG Technologies Q3 Community Powered Threat Report released today.
AVG predicted growing sophistication in mobile malware earlier in 2012 and the Q3 threat report affirms that suspicion, with mobile cybercrime being the biggest trend of the third quarter. Malware known as Zitmo (or Zeus in the Mobile), a new version of well know malware Zeus-on-PC has recently been spotted, targeting the 1 billion smart phone users globally. AVG has been tracking its evolution and has identified how hackers are exploiting the growth in mobile banking by releasing Zitmo for mobile platforms, notably Android, in very controlled attacks.
A 2012
PriceWaterhouseCoopers’ report
“Zitmo is not new malware as such; but the new ways in which we are seeing cybercriminals use it underlines this worrying trend of socially engineering security attacks to match evolving consumer habits,” said Michael McKinnon, Security Advisor at AVG Technologies AU. “We always recommend consumers exercise care when sourcing and downloading apps onto their smartphones, as unofficial third party sites are usually the best places for cybercriminals to seed malware-ridden versions of popular apps. People get caught out because they cannot tell if they have the malware on their phone, so it’s best to install mobile security software and keep it updated in order to have peace of mind when using mobile banking and social networking services.”
Consumers using social networks are increasingly at risk as cybercriminals can now buy ready-made malware on subscription. Social networkers were hit this quarter by an explosion of attacks using the notorious Blackhole Exploit kit, the first ‘commercial’ malware. The attack left users unable to log-on to their accounts or access any games or applications as cybercriminals coordinated the attacks from multiple external advertising servers, which generated an exceptional increase from 250,000 attacks to over 1.6m recorded events within an eight hour period.
To download the full
Q3 2012 Community Powered Threat Report, please visit:
http://www.avg.co.nz/files/media/avg_threat_report_2012-q3.pdf
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About the report
The AVG
Community Protection Network is an online neighbourhood
watch, where community members work to protect each other.
Information about the latest threats is collected from
customers who participate in the product improvement program
and shared with the community to make sure everyone receives
the best possible protection.
The AVG Community Powered Threat Report is based on the Community Protection Network traffic and data collected from participating AVG users over a three-month period, followed by analysis by AVG. It provides an overview of web, mobile devices, spam risks and threats. All statistics referenced are obtained from the AVG Community Protection Network.
AVG has focused on building
communities that help millions of online participants
support each other on computer security issues and actively
contribute to AVG’s research efforts.
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AVG — www.avg.co.nz
AVG Technologies’ mission is to simplify, optimise and
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