Twitter as a messaging platform is a major target for cybercriminals, and according to security firm TrendMicro there are more than 20,000 accounts used in phishing campaigns and sending malicious links.
The system is simple, targeting unsuspecting users and redirecting them to fake pages that look like Twitter to log in.
After hacking an account, criminals start sending messages to the victim's friends, urging them to click on a link that leads to a phishing page. The malicious address loads a fake Twitter login page, creating the impression that the user has been logged out for some reason.
The potential victim tries to log in again, but all information is sent directly to the scammers.
Security firm TrendMicro observed this phishing scheme over a three-month period, starting on March 1, 2014. Their research results indicate that, during peak days, the scammers were using more than 20,000 accounts to send malicious links to over 13,000 separate addresses.
22,282 accounts were compromised on March 18, 2014, and used to distribute phishing links. A day later, 23,372 users were sent malicious URLs with 5,148 different addresses.
“Since June, however, Twitter has begun to limit the volume of malicious links, and phishing has decreased significantly,” Jon Oliver, senior fellow at TrendLabs, said in a statement.
Phishing on Twitter is difficult to curb
Tracking malicious activity on Twitter is particularly difficult for security researchers because they cannot use automated tools that are effective at detecting malware.
Honeypots, sandboxes, and web reputation tools cannot catch malicious messages because they are sent by legitimate users and contain shortened URLs.
According to the company's research, the largest number of clicks (49%) on phishing links recorded during the three-month study came from the United States, followed closely by Japan, with 15%.
Other countries that fell into the traps of scammers are Australia (6%), the United Kingdom (5%), Canada (4%), the Philippines, Malaysia, and France with 2% each, Indonesia and the Netherlands with 1% each.
Source: secnews.gr
