Apple’s latest creation – the iPad, has unsurprisingly been targeted by black hat SEO spammers who have successfully corrupted the first 20 results on Google. The SEO campaign has tried to trick users by attaching themselves to popular keywords such as ‘Apple iPad rumour’ and ‘Apple tablet’.
When users visit these sites, they are told to download ‘rouge security software’ which is a virus that can infect their computers. Black hat spammers are known for following hot off the press news to try and get people clicking through to their corrupt sites.
The group SPAMfighter commented: “Apple’s much hyped iPad launch is just another example of how spammers capitalise on ‘of-the-moment’ news developments and prey on unsuspecting users. People should never click on links via email from unknown sources, despite how tempting the deal or offer may be.”
Search engine Google is usually quick at blocking these sites, but these new attacks beat Google to it and changed domains to confuse the search engine. Anti-virus company Symantec is warning users to look at iPad results more carefully and to only visit trusted news sites.
SPAMfighter co-founder Martin Thorborg emphasised the importance of having an anti-virus software installed into their machines, saying: ”To avoid being a victim, be vigilant, keep your anti-spam filter up-to-date and use a community-based spam filter as an additional layer of security to help reduce the amount of harmful spam you can potentially receive.”
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