Hackers hunt prey on smartphones, Facebook
Hackers are following prey onto smartphones and social networking hotspots, according to reports released Tuesday by a pair of computer security firms. Cyber criminals are also ramping up the sophistication and frequency of attacks on business and government networks, one of the companies, Symantec, said in the latest volume of its Internet Security Threat Report.
Symantec depicted a “massive” volume of more than 286 new computer threats on the Internet last year, continued growth in attacks at online social networks and “a notable shift in focus” by hackers to mobile devices. “The major mobile platforms are finally becoming ubiquitous enough to garner the attention of attackers,” Symantec said in its findings.
In March, smartphones running on Google-backed Android software were the target of the largest attack ever on the devices, noted a PandaLabs report focused on the first three months of this year. “This assault was launched from malicious applications on Android Market, the official app store for the operating system,” PandaLabs said. Within a four-day span, seemingly legitimate Android smartphone applications rigged with malicious “Trojan” computer code were downloaded more than 50,000 times, according to PandaLabs.