Sunday, March 15, 2020

"Live Coronavirus Map Used to Spread Malware"

Spreading viruses. Where the digital world meets the corporeal:


 
Drawing Hands M.C. Escher, 1948
From Krebs on Security:
Cybercriminals constantly latch on to news items that captivate the public’s attention, but usually they do so by sensationalizing the topic or spreading misinformation about it. Recently, however, cybercrooks have started disseminating real-time, accurate information about global infection rates tied to the Coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic in a bid to infect computers with malicious software.
A recent snapshot of the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus data map, available at coronavirus.jhu.edu.
In one scheme, an interactive dashboard of Coronavirus infections and deaths produced by Johns Hopkins University is being used in malicious Web sites (and possibly spam emails) to spread password-stealing malware....
....MUCH MORE

We have the Johns Hopkins coronavirus dashboard linked in the blogroll at right as "Covid-19 Tracker."

Mr. Krebs is very good at what he does and has broken some important cybersecurity stories but for some reason I have a mental glitch where every time I see his name I flash on Lotte Lenya in "From Russia With Love":
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/jamesbond/images/c/cf/Rosa_Klebb_%28Lotte_Lenya%29_-_Profile.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20130601195232
Rosa Klebb
I would have liked to talk to her.
Berlin in the '20's, the Brecht-Weill crowd, she was right there in the middle of it, but then I remind myself it's Brian Krebs, not Klebb, and the whole Mack the Knife thing fades to black.