FTC settles with rogue antivirus vendor ByteHosting
Monday, June 29, 2009
The Federal Trade Commission last week settled its case against ByteHosting, an alleged vendor of phony antivirus software known as scareware. The FTC said the defendants tricked more than 1 million people into buying fake antivirus products.
In its judgment of nearly $1.9 million against James Reno and ByteHosting Internet Services, FTC agreed to reduce the amount to $116,000 due to the defendants' inability to pay. FTC said the full judgment represented the gross revenues realized from the alleged scam.
FTC said Reno and ByteHosting were part of a massive deceptive advertising scheme that tricked consumers into buying rogue web security products, including WinFixer, WinAntivirus, DriveCleaner, ErrorSafe and XP Antivirus.
The scheme allegedly relied on deceptive advertisements featuring bogus computer scans that falsely claimed to detect viruses, spyware and illegal pornography on consumers' computers.
Reno and ByteHosting are prohibited from using deceptive scareware advertising tactics and from installing malicious programs on consumers' computers. The settlement also permanently bars Reno and ByteHosting from ever again doing business with their co-defendants.
Microsoft said earlier this month that infections by scareware spiked dramatically worldwide in the second half of 2008.
Related News:
Web security professionals skeptical of national broadband - 3.18.2010
Leading web security experts believe that the recently released National Broadband Program is potentially a major risk to national web security. As more people move from dial-up and other slower forms of internet access, they will be exposed to malware and be unable to handle it.
Authorities call for increased URL regulation - 3.18.2010
In an effort to attack malware at the root of the problem, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency submitted a new list of recommendations to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers that would make it more difficult to register a domain on the web, according to IT World Canada.
Latest web security problems for Facebook - 3.18.2010
McAfee advises all users of Facebook to carefully analyze any email received from the social networking giant in the next few weeks as several users have reported receiving emails requesting they change their password. Phishing scams related to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter have become one of the best methods for cyber criminals to compromise web security.
FBI goes online to find all kinds of cyber criminals - 3.18.2010
The Federal Bureau of Investigation recently announced a plan to use social networks to target criminal activites that happen online, according to Information Week. The bureau will mostly seek information made public by account holders, but it did say that it will consider undercover work when necessary.
Cyber criminals target web security through PDFs again - 3.17.2010
Earlier this year, Adobe released a security update to patch a hole that cyber criminals exploited to upload malware onto the computers of unsuspecting users. However, Marian Radu, a web security researher for Microsoft recently announced on his blog that he had discovered a similar vulnerability.
|
