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| Malware covers up the most successful movies |
Popular films caught the attention of scammers, and no one is more susceptible to misguided rogues than a group of movie goers who want to know more about Oscar-winning films.
In order to better understand how fraudsters can use our interest in popular and interesting films, Kaspersky researchers are very concerned with the popularity of this fraud. More than 20 phishing sites and 925 results files were found this year, showing that those looking for a good night watch the latest movies on screen, follow events, and check for phishing and malware.
Kaspersky gave users the opportunity to view the candidate films for free, noting that more than 20 phishing sites and Twitter accounts cheated on users. Phishing sites collect user data and ask them to do various tasks to access the movies they need.
These requirements can range from requesting questionnaires to passing user personal data to installing adware or even requesting to disclose credit card details. Needless to say, users get nothing at the end of the process.
Kaspersky researchers analyze the films you are likely to win:
- Ford v Ferarri
- Jojo Rabbit
- Joker
- Little Women
- Marriage story
- Once upon a time in Hollywood
- Parasite
- The Irishman
To help promote fraudulent websites, cyber criminals have also created Twitter accounts that access content and use malicious files spread across different channels to fraud successfully.
Malicious files published online, which contain copies of Oscar-nominated films, confirmed the interest of the winners, and Kaspersky researchers compared the malicious activities of the nominated films four weeks after the film's premiere, and as a result, the clown film was among the films that were viewed. Classified. The film was the first most used among cyber crooks, with 304 malicious files named after the villain Gotham.
In 1917, 215 malicious files ranked second in this category, Irish one with 179 files, and the Korean movie Parasite had no harmful activity.
Kaspersky also examined whether the number of malicious files increased significantly after the release of the film, indicating that most of the malicious files appeared in the third or fourth week after the release of the movie, albeit in some cases before the first distributed premiere.
Kaspersky experts have also analyzed the ability of films to try to find illegal versions on the Internet by comparing malicious activity after the first limited release of cinema and after it was actually released on the Netflix platform.
Take the example of Murridge. No malware was found after the release of the movie or after going to the movies, but cyber criminals used the title of the movie after its release on Netflix, reflecting interest in the movie.
Take for example the long-awaited Irish movie. Although the number of users most willing to find a copy of the movie on the Internet is determined after the release of Netflix, the number of discoveries is higher due to the first release of the film, which is limited to the screen.
The malware analyst at Kaspersky Anton Ivanov said: “The crooks are not exactly related to the release date of the movie. They just distributed the malware and added:“ Since they are always looking for things that get a lot of attention, they depend on the needs of the users and the availability of the actual files. In order not to be cheated by criminals, you should go to the apartment. Hold the broadcast and legal subscription form to make sure you can be on TV.
Kaspersky recommends the following steps to avoid being exposed to malware attacks that appear to be popular movies or TV shows:
- Note the release dates of official movies for cinemas, direct services, TV, or other sources.
- Do not click on suspicious links when checking the movie release date and tracking it in theaters.
- Check the extension of the downloaded file. Even if you download a video file from a trusted source, the file must have an avi, mkv, or mp4 extension for other video formats (of course it does not exe).
- Check the site and just visit the sites where you can watch the movie after making sure the movie is legal and starts with https. Check the URL and name characters to ensure the site is official, and domain registration details start before downloading movies.
- Use a reliable security solution like Kaspersky Security Cloud to defend yourself against various threats.