Criminals Exploit Tragedy of Missing Flight MH370 to Spread Malware on Facebook

Itproportal.com reported on 14th March, 2014 stating a warning by security experts as "scammers are exploiting this tragedy of mysteriously disappeared of Malaysian Airlines carrier jet Flight MH370 to taint users of Facebook with malware."

The aircraft in question (MH370) disappeared on Saturday, 8th March, 2014 somewhere above the Gulf of Thailand between Malaysia and Vietnam. The flight with 239 people on board was going to Beijing and more than 25 nations are involved in search operation but till now the plane could not be traced.

The latest sting comes as posts which tell the recipient that the ill-fated Malaysia Plane (MH370) has been located somewhere close to the Bermuda Triangle with shocking videos of the wreckage been released today.

This, despite the fact that Bermuda is approximately 10,000 miles far from the final point of contact by flight MH370 with air traffic base stations situated at east of Malaysia over the South China Sea which is just 40 minutes away after take-off from Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia's capital).

The alleged video contains stills showing many planes being retrieved from the ocean but, they are not MH370.

Users clicking on the video are impelled to 'Like' the hacker's page on FB (Facebook) before being persuaded to download the malware to infect the system.

Unfortunately, this is not the first time nor the last time that cold-hearted cyber scammers and malware peddlers have used fake news on tragic events to scam users.

According to a statement published by theregister.co.uk on 17th March, 2014, Chris Boyd, malware Intelligence Analyst of Malwarebytes, writes "If you are asked to share content or like something before watching a "shocking video" or you are asked to complete surveys then most likely it may be a scam."

Therefore, if you have already shared or "liked" the link, then you should delete the malicious post from your Facebook wall and if you downloaded by clicking then Internauts are advised to run an anti-malware scan with a reputed antivirus.

Security experts further suggest that it is always good to get your news from a reputed news sites and must avoid similar offers coming through emails, Facebook or any other social network.

» SPAMfighter News - 3/24/2014