Digital Marketing Consultant

McAfee’s Annual Malware report stresses some extra unnerving information:

“This year we saw an increase in the sophistication of some threats.  ‘Signed’ malware that imitates legitimate files will become more prevalent in 2011.  This will cause an increase in stolen keys as well as the techniques and tools to forge fake keys to use in these types of attacks.

“’Friendly fire’ in which threats appear to come from friends via social media such as Koobface and VBMania will continue to grow.  This will go hand-in-hand with the increased abuse of social networks, which will eventually overtake email as a leading attach vector.

“We also expect to see an increase in “smart bomb” attacks, those designed to trigger under certain conditions but not others.  These threats require victims to follow the designated attack path, i.e. thwarting honeypots, crawlers, and security researcher, while greatly impacting designated and vulnerable targets.  Such threats will create an even greater need for Global Threat Intelligence to defend against attacks observed under specific circumstances.

“Personalized attacks are about to get a whole lot more personal.”

We have a client (of whom we cannot rid ourselves, as much as we try) who refuses to understand anything about how his computer system can become a danger to everyone else.  So until some malware actually jams up his system to the point of not running at all, he merrily continues to spew out bots and malware to each and every customer and friend.  This would not even be a problem if he were not so cheap as to spend money on an anti-virus system and then KEEP IT UP TO DATE!

Almost all of the anti-malware systems today are quite good.  The competition is huge.  I use a professional version of AVG, but I have no preferrence.  Everything I read about the competing systems seems positive.

As hopefully you know, most protective systems today are downright automatic if you are willing to pay a small fee.  In the meantime, if you don’t, you are hurting everyone to whom you are connected. 

Shortened URL services have been all over the net, supplied from more and more Internet companies vying for your interest in them.  The competition is stiff.  I, personally, use bit.ly.  Why?  Because that is the one I started with since it was one of the early suppliers.  Not for any other reason even though I have noticed that bit.ly has be bought out and is supplying simpler usage.

At first, I did not understand why I would want to use this service at all.  I didn't care if shortening helped Tweeting.  But as I have discovered the space it saves everywhere, it has become something I use more often.  It is obvious that it is easier to send "http://bit.ly/amyrCl" to someone than to send the same thing as "http://www.linkedin.com/profile?viewProfile=&key=34738373&invAcpt=245...."  Even if that someone is your mother.

I also found that, if I registered, I could customize the shortened link to actually have a meaning rather than just be a jumble of letters and numbers.  So I use shortened URLs more and more.

I just want you to be aware of the other side of the coin.  I was reading the McAfee report.  I quote:

"Short URL Service Abuse: Short URLs make sense when used in social media as well as in other forms.  Short links are easier to paste or type.  The trouble, and abuse, follows because users do not know where these shortened links actually lead until they click them.  This is a huge opportunity for abuse.  Spanners have already latched onto short URLSs to evade traditionl filters.  McAfee Labs expects to see short URL abuse invade all other forms of Internet communications.  We currently track and analyze, through multiple social media applications and all URL shortining services, more than 3,000 shortened URLs per minute.  We see a growing number of these used for spam, scamming, and other malicious purposes.  This nominal convenience will have a tremendous impact on the success of cybercriminals and scammers as they leverage the immediacy of social media over email for even greater success."

So does this mean that I, as an Internet Marketing Consultant, should ask prospects to NOT open my shortened URLs?  Should I warn people away?  I think not.

The answer is, when you see a shortened URL, take into consideration from where it is coming.  Be sure it is coming from a reputable source, just as you should with any link.  It should not be harder than that.

I hate to say this, but if you are not careful, you will get yourself into trouble with Social Media.  McAfee Labs puts out a report each year which tries to forecast what is coming up in the way of trouble...and it ain't pretty.  It concerns both the Internet and the cell phone.  It concerns the hardware and the software.  It concerns Facebook and Twitter.

I will take some of the sections about which you should inform yourself starting with this quote:

“Social media connections will
eventually replace email as the
primary vector for distributing
malicious code and links.”

Further the report says, "The threats landscape has changed considerably in the past year. McAfee Labs has seen marked increases in malware sophistication and targeting as well as a continued increase in the overall volume of daily malware threats. We have also begun to see some very significant changes in the types of threats that aim at Apple iPhones and other mobile devices. But there is good news, too, primarily a significant decrease in the daily amounts of email spam we combat. These ups and downs lead us to wonder how threats are evolving."

Please make sure your family is aware.  Follow along.  I will report more on this tomorrow.