MSNBCcomBreakingNews

MSNBC.com – Breaking News, similar to CNN.com Daily Top 10 and CNN Alerts: My Custom Alert is a spam email created by hackers intended to look like it was sent by MSNBC.com. ‘MSNBC.com – Breaking News’ email poses as a notification email that says:

“BREAKING NEWS: Millions of credit card numbers stolen from bank database, find out if you are affected

Find out more at http://breakingnews.msnbc.com..”

If you click on the hyperlink breakingnews.msnbc.com, you will not be taken to msnbc.com, but instead you’ll be redirected to a rogue website where a screen will appear informing you that the Flash player you have has to be updated.

Once you decide to download the Flash player’s latest version, you will be downloading abobe_flash.exe file, which is, in reality, a Trojan Downloader. If the Trojan Downloader is installed, it will open a loophole in your computer system through which additional malware and rogue anti-spyware programs (such as, Antivirus XP 2008) will be installed. Beware of emails that have the following email subjects:

msnbc.com – BREAKING NEWS: Millions of credic card numbers stolen from bank database, find out if you are affected
msnbc.com – BREAKING NEWS: Time Warner sells AOL
msnbc.com – BREAKING NEWS: Americans loves to sue people
msnbc.com – BREAKING NEWS: How to save money on gas

To click and download files that are associated with “MSNBC.com – Breaking News” email may lead to a Trojan Downloader infecting your machine which may modify your Windows Registry, cause the “Blue Screen of Death” screensaver to appear, and display a flood of popups and fake system alert messages.
More Information by Security Experts

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 14:32:15 EST