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Unfortunately, the word “hacking” is no longer synonymous with computer programming or even with satisfying someone’s ego or claiming bragging rights for having harmlessly infiltrated a website. The so-called “black hat” hackers have given the whole field of hacking a bad name.
Nowadays, black hat hackers are in it for profit, and part of that profit is the spreading of computer viruses. The hackers don’t care if they corrupt programs and destroy data or even reformat victims’ entire hard drives. They don’t care about the pain it causes or about the fact that it can even put a small business out of commission. In fact, they like it!
One nasty moneymaking scheme that first emerged in 2005 is called Ransomware by computer experts. The hacker holds data on the victim’s computer hostage by encrypting it, and the victim is asked to pay a ransom fee to undo the damage.
With more and more people backing up their data online, less important data is at risk on the average personal or business hard drive that has been in the past. Therefore, this does not generate as much profit as it has in the past and so there is less motivation to develop ever-more sophisticated viruses to counteract the improved computer network security.
This has not stopped the virus writers, however. The new motivation for writing viruses is to turn victims’ PCs into spam distribution machines. Spam is commercial or fraudulent e-mail sent without the recipient’s permission. Virus writers attempt to gain control of strangers’ PCs through a trojan horse which gives them full access rights. When the PC is controlled by the spammer, it is known as a “zombie,” and a collection of such computers is called a “botnet.”
How can this profit the hacker? He can threaten a “Distributed Denial of Service” (DDoS) attack against a website in an effort to extort money, or he can hire out his botnet to other hackers.
However, the most frequent use of a botnet is to send out spam messages. In fact, the software security company Sophos estimates that 50% of all spam is sent this way. The profit motivation is the payment the hackers receive for driving traffic to advertising sites. The fact that the PCs doing the dirty work are not their own helps hackers and spammers to cover their tracks
Although viruses and Trojan horses are far less common on Macs than on PCs, Mac users are not immune. In addition, Mac users suffer the consequences of spambots when it comes to trying to sort the spam messages from the legitimate ones in their e-mail inboxes. Mac webmasters can also be victimized when their websites or blogs are broken onto and injected with malware in an attempt to infect the computers of visitors. I should know; it has happened to me!
Here are some tips to help keep your PC or blog from being infected.
• Update the operating system on your PC regularly. Virus writers exploit vulnerabilities in outdated software.
• Install a good antivirus program and keep it current with updated virus definitions.
• Install a personal firewall on your PC. Alternatively, you can purchase a router with a hardware firewall. Whatever your choice, it should filter both incoming and outgoing traffic to the Internet.
• Don’t open email with attachments you aren’t expecting. Sometimes spammers will try to trick you into opening an attachment on a fake bounced mail message or by other means. Use a filter to reduce the amount of spam you receive.
If you are a blogger on WordPress, keep the following tips in mind to keep your blog from being hacked:
• Just as with your operating system, you should update your WordPresss installation immediately whenever an update becomes available. These often fix vulnarabilities.
• Avoid installing too many plugins, as some may contain vulnarabilities that could make your blog more susceptivle to hackers.
• Install a plugin such as WordPress Database Backup that will make automatic backups of your blog.
Spammers and hackers attempt to make their profits the dirty way: on the backs of legitimate computer users. Keeping your computer from being infected is the best way to fight back.
