We all have experienced many online threats last year. And as year changes to 2010, the more online threats are changing too. Cybercriminals will be more eager to spread online threats and attack computers to benefit with any valuable information challenging users for security.

Here are some of the predictions that will challenge computer security this year:

1. Spam, Scams on Social Networking and Real-time Sites – A group of security researchers belonging from Websense, Breach Security, IBM Internet Security Systems‘ X-Force, and Symantec agreed that cybercriminals will focus their attacks on social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn, and on real-time social sites like Twitter. When it comes to real-time features, Google, especially Google Wave, as well as Bing will be their target. The attackers enjoy the fact it will take time for others to discover the existence of a malicious link or file. Users may recognize one but still one way or another, there will still be victims.

2. Crime Cloud – Security vendors specifically AVG, M86, and RSA predicted that criminals will be attacking and using use cloud services directly to control attacks. and using them to direct and control attacks. IBM researchers are anticipating to see attackers exploiting more services. Take Amazon AWS for example which already served as a host for a malware command and control server.

3. Malware Hijacking Trusted Sites – Breach Security observes continuous improvements when it comes to compromising trusted sites and infecting them with malware. Numerous incidents of SQL injection has been proven successful in attacking sites. No doubt, it will happen again. Cybercriminals prefer to have a third-party that will distribute their malware.

4. Macs Will Be Compromised – It’s been years now that security companies have been talking about Mac being targeted by attackers for malware. According to Websense, exploitation will happen affecting Safari under Mac OS X which will invite hackers to target the Mac platform. Symantec is worried that Mac users who are not spending money to buy antivirus software yearly will not be protected with such attack. Zscaler still believe that Apple can somehow oblige the company to strengthen its security to surpassed continuous attacks. Many think Macs will be widely affected because of Adobe Flash vulnerability.

5. Search Engine Poisoning and Malvertising – Cybercriminals will exert more efforts on exploiting trusted sites. For them to infect sites, they will make use of search engines and advertisements. They will continue to threaten and weaken search results and enjoy the attention breaking news and events. Google together with Microsoft will assure its users for a safe search and advertising. Of course, they wouldn’t want their users to not trust them.

6. Increasing Number of Bots – Why would cyber criminals waste their time with cloud-hosted malware when botnets can do the same thing? Botnets are better than cybercriminals. It can also be a source of income generating cash for criminals and hijacking other botnets for money. This will cause conflict preventing botnets to grow and attracting security experts and law enforcement. It’s botnets against other botnets. It’s like what happened to Zeus/Zbot being shut down by Bredolab botnet. Symantec claimed that botnets have become the foundation of cybercrime.

7. Piracy Gets Riskier – Microsoft has started making a move to lessen software piracy since last December. They received many complaints from users who buy the pirated version of Windows. IBM researchers are expecting that the continuous use of the pirated software will infection more users will malware.

8. Mobile Security Issue – Smartphones like iPhone and Android-based handsets are like miniature personal computers. They are being used for business purposes. In 2010, Websense predicted that smartphones will be targeted for attacks just like the computers. Nowadays, security vendors either have or are developing a mobile security product service. IBM thinks that mobile attacks will still be limited.

9. Major Insider Theft Scandal Will – It is expected next year that someone who has been in a large organization accessing company data will be caught to be working for or with a cybercrime group. The Identity Theft Resource expected that the number of insider cases will increase because of failure to follow basic workplace security protocols.

10. Clickjacking is Back – According to Zscaler, clickjacking will strike back. Clickjacking is a malicious technique that tricks users to reveal confidential information or take control of their computer while clicking the sites. Jeremiah Grossman of WhiteHat Security and Robert “RSnake” Hansen of SecTheory reveal about the technique in October 2008. Efforts have made to lessen the risk of clickjacking but it is still effective to use especially with a social engineering component.

How Can Techie Now Help?

The above security threats serves as a reminder for computer users to be careful over the web. You’ll never know what security threat you will be into. For now, the best protection is a reliable and updated antivirus software that will keep you and your computer in trouble. When it comes to your computer’s protection, Techie Now is the name you can trust. Techie Now offers PC support services: virus and spyware removal, performance optimization, installation and configuration and general repair.

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Iranian Cyber Army, an anti-American group, hacked Twitter, a micro-blogging site, last week. The shut down lasted for more than an hour. During that time, visitors of Twitter redirected automatically to another site which shows a green flag with English and Arabic writing stating:
“This site has been hacked by the Iranian Cyber Army.”

The said Iranian protesters stated that they control and manage internet access with their power and not USA alone as what they thought, so Americans should not provoke the Iranian people.
Dync Inc., a company based in New Hampshire that directs that traffic for Twitter, said that the hackers got credentials to redirect Twitter’s traffic to a bogus site. TechCrunch reported that the said disruption also affected Google searches for Twitter. Twitter’s DNS have been fixed after being temporarily compromised with the said group.

According to Twitter’s co-founder, Biz Stone, they will update with more information after they have done the investigation. Many speculated that the said cyber attack was the revenge to the Twitter’s role in the election protests earlier this year. Iranians used Twitter to express their protest against what they believed to be an unfair result of the election last June but the U. S. State Department advised Twitter to delay maintenance interrupting the site’s service during the peak of demonstrations.

How Can Techie Now Help?

Millions of people has been using Twitter every day to communicate and express what they feel. The Iranians used it to speak out during the election and the Iranian Cyber Army has hacked it to revenge and deface the site but not the users. It’s the same as hacking a computer. If you want your PC to be protected, Techie Now is available to provide PC support services: virus and spyware removal, performance optimization, installation and configuration, and general repair. Techie Now can definitely give what your PC needs.

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Primary schools will be teaching children as young as 5 to “zip it, block it, flag it” as part of the new internet safety campaign. This new strategy targets children directly, rather than their parents. The same situation happened when the Green Cross Code clearly instructed the children on how to cross the road safely in the 1970s.

Experts are afraid that parents are not being strict when it comes to internet that they are not helping their children themselves to be aware of internet safety. According to the campaign:

• “Zip it” – tells not to give out personal details online.
• “Block it” – informs children not to open e-mails or attachments from people or companies they are not familiar of or block off anyone who sends hurtful messages.
• “Flag it” – asks them to tell an adult if they find something alarming or frightening them online.

Starting September 2011, internet safety will become a compulsory part of the national curriculum. Research showed that one in the five of the 99 percent of the children (ages 8 to 17 years) had encounter inappropriate content while using the internet. Some children said that their parents were not monitoring their online activity. The industry has offered parents more careful privacy settings like including a secret password to their computer.

Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister of the United kingdom and Leader of the Labour Party, revealed that he and his wife, Sarah, had experienced a big problem on internet safety after leaving their younger son Fraser unsupervised with the home computer switched on, in a breach of the safety advice. Last week, Frasier had typed out a message in gobbledegook and then pressed “send” while Sarah was out of the room, sending the message to all Sarah’s followers in Twitter. Calls flooded Downing Street asking if someone hacked into their private account. Mr. Brown admitted that it was their mistake that they were not able to supervise the internet and they have learned their lessons from that. According to Dr. Byron, leaving a child unsupervised on the internet is like leaving a child at the deep end of a swimming pool without proper supervision.

How Can Techie Now Help?

Since inappropriate content are everywhere in the internet, parents must be responsible enough to supervise their children while using the computer or face the worst consequence. It’s a good thing that primary schools will be teaching children to be careful online as part of the new internet safety campaign. If you want to keep your computer in good shape, contact Techie Now. We have available PC support services that you need: virus and spyware removal, performance optimization, installation and configuration, and general repair. With, Techie Now, you and your PC is safe and protected.

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Six months after Bing search engine was first shown as a beta, Microsoft officially launched the UK localized of Bing last November 13, 2009. The time has come for Bing to be taken out of beta because UK was really happy on its performance.

Microsoft’s search engine changes over the years, from MSN Search, Windows Live Search, Live Search and lastly Bing. Google was persistently creating a name of its own during the time that Bing is coming up with a name. Google really become part of the people’s everyday lives. Microsoft know that Bing is not going to overthrow Google search engine but they want to try the chance of putting itself in there because any percentage increase in search margin is worth a huge amount in advertising revenue. And then it is better if Bing will help to slow down Google.

Marie Thirlwall, one of Bing’s UK product managers, told IT PRO that it would be great if Bing could get to number two. Bing may not reach its verb status but at least many are aware now of the word “Bing”.

So, Bing is out of beta now. Most people use Google as their default engine in the search bar located at the top right of their browser. If you want to add Bing to Firefox, it’s easy to do. You just have to install this add-on.

Many people like Bing because of its homepage design. You can choose an image from its archive of images via arrows at the bottom right. These images overlays with hotspots which when clicked will redirect you to interesting links, images and videos about the subject of the picture. According to Microsoft, they refer Bing as more of a decision engine than a search engine. You will see an explorer bar down the side of all searches where you’ll find related searches or search refinements making things more convenient to you.

Bing’s image search remains a highlight since its first release. It has larger default images compared to Google showing further details when you roll over an image. The filters for the images, such as large and small can be seen on the lower side. In fact, Google also has the same options where you need to click the “Show options” at the top to filter the image it’s more clearly shown in Bing. With Bing, you can use infinite scroll features to see more choices of images compared to Google that you still need to click the “Next” button to see more results. Bing videos is modernized with videos that play automatically when you scroll over them. It is really impressive because videos don’t lag. Videos are filtered according to length, aspect ratio, resolution and size.

Bing maps have undergone some changes. All its data is co-located around the world. There are some changes made in the Bing maps interface. It’s now easier to reorder saved push pins and different points on a plotted route could now be grabbed and moved which is also available in Google maps. Users can now embed Bing maps in web pages. Educational institutions and non-profit organizations could now use it for free but limited to 125,000 sessions. Business and location searches in here are separated out. Bing maps also offers another feature, a “Bird’s Eye” view, which is actually an angled, ‘isometric’ view. Compared to Google’s Street View, it looks nice but it isn’t that helpful in identifying where you’re going unless you plan to travel by micro-light.

Bing shopping is an area that Microsoft worked for to make it perfect for the UK. It has it has now fully included the “Ciao!” comparison engine into Bing itself. The layout is still confusing. You will appreciate “Reviews” tab on the left as this is something we often want when looking for products. With Bing, much of the promised UK localization works well. It is nice to know that it gives slightly more detail than Google. It also deals with businesses. Another great feature is visual search. It is designed to know exactly what you’re looking for by name. Just type the word you are searching and it will display a gallery of images for you to browse. It is a helpful feature although it’s only limited to what Bing can provide with only five options available.

Bing also has other primary features: the Twitter and Wolfram Alpha integration. Visit Open www.bing.com/twitter where you will find topics with some Tweets. You can also search anyone’s Tweets by typing the person’s Twitter name. Wolfram Alpha searches are also now live in the UK and will only work on calculations that it knows to explicitly send to the Wolfram Alpha database, but at least Bing can now keep pace with Google for integrated calculations.

Microsoft has created Bing on usability, accuracy and speed, and taken it out of beta. It knows that Bing does as well as Google. Others might find it easier and more satisfying to use compared to Google.

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Trend Micro’s threat research revealed that Koobface botnet is abusing Google Reader by spamming URLS redirecting Internet users to infected websites through Youtube.

Google Reader is a Google-owned free service allowing users to monitor and share websites for new content. Koobface has been spamming URLs on social networking sites like Facebook, Myspace and Twitter. Koobface is spamming Google Reader now. A Google account is made and controlled by Koobface gang, hosting a page with a fake YouTube video. As the victim clicks the fake video, it will redirect to a compromised website, which also hosts another fake YouTube video. The user will be infected and becomes part of the Koobface botnet. Attackers use Google Reader’s to share links and messages between users to host an image resembling a Flash video. When the user tries to view the video, it will redirect to a fake YouTube page containing a video. As in previous attacks, the user was soon prompted with an alert that invited them to upgrade their Flash player. Hidden was the fact that instead of the updated software, the user was downloading the Koobface downloader component that would that take over the victim’s computer.

Trend Micro, the IT security vendor, has reported Koobface to Google for spamming more than 1300 known and unique fake Google Reader accounts. Nowadays, cybercriminals take advantage of Google because of its credibility that they hide malicious links behind Google Reader.

How Can Techie Now Help?

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