Twitter Blackhole malware attack spreading

Sophos is warning Twitter users to be cautious, following the discovery of a widely spread malware attack on the micro-blogging site. Malicious links, claiming to be an online photo of the Twitter user, are at present being spammed out across the social network. The links point to Russian Web pages that ultimately attempt to infect Windows PCs using the Blackhole exploit kit.

At present, the dangerous tweets say: "It's you on photo?" or "It's about you?", followed by a link.

The cyber criminals behind the campaign could change the wording used in the tweets at any time.

"If you see tweets like this, do not click on them," says Brett Myroff, CEO of Sophos distributor, NetXactics. "There isn't a photo at the end of the link, and the accounts that are spreading the messages have either been compromised by hackers or have been created by hackers with the purpose of spreading the dangerous links.

"There's a real danger that if Twitter users have not properly protected their PCs, and unless they are warned of the risk, many people will click on the links without suspecting that they are putting their computer and personal data at risk," he adds.