Tue, Dec 22 2009 7:47 Don

How The Koobface Worm Gang Makes Money

Chances are you know someone who has been hit by Koobface, one of the first successful social networking worms. But there are many faces to Koobface, and many ways its authors make money from it.

New research from Trend Micro details how Koobface's creators monetize the worm through scareware or fake antivirus, click fraud, information-stealing malware, and online dating services. "Unlike in the past when we always thought of malware as one piece of malware, like Melissa or Lovebug, in today's world Koobface is an ongoing criminal enterprise using hundreds and thousands of pieces of code," says David Perry, global director of education for Trend Micro. "That makes it more difficult to describe to the public at large. It's not just one file."

Continues at darkreading.com

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