Blackhole Malware Exploit Twitter
After Twitter went down yesterday, there are reports of a new malware virus being spread under the guise of picture-posting, according to Naked Security. The virus apparently tweets at various users, stating "It's you in photo?" After the grammatically incorrect dialogue, there is a link to the supposed image, where your computer is then infected via a Blackhole exploit.

After Twitter went down yesterday, there are reports of a new malware virus being spread under the guise of picture-posting, according to Naked Security. The virus apparently tweets at various users, stating "It's you in photo?" After the grammatically incorrect dialogue, there is a link to the supposed image, where your computer is then infected via a Blackhole exploit.

The malware seems to stem from Russia, according to the Naked Security article, as the domains and the Twitter accounts being used to commit the hacking spree contain Russian characters or are simply default Twitter user logos. The Blackhole hack basically infects your system and looks for exploits targeting "a range of client vulnerabilities, with recent emphasis on vulnerabilities in Adobe Reader, Adobe Flash and Java." The hack primarily focuses on code in an effort to extract information from an individual's PC, websites visited, etc.

Attacks like this via Twitter are nothing new, however; the wording of these tweets could be changed at a moment's notice. Typically, if anyone other than someone you know tweets a picture of you, it's best to avoid it. Up-to-date antivirus software like AVG should be able to detect the issues upon clicking the link, should you make the mistake of doing so. That said, there's no guarantee that the virus/malware intrusion will be removed or eliminated due to having a solid antivirus program.