Flame is hailed as the most
sophisticated cyber weapon built to date. Discovered last month, it is currently
the most talked about issue in the security community.
Flame is designed to propagate by
intercepting window update requests to surreptiously install itself onto
computers. The virus has the ability to self propagate over a local network and
record audio,
screenshots, keyboard activity and network
traffic. This data, along with locally
stored documents, is sent to servers on the Internet controlled by the creators
of Flame.
Flame was primarily designed for
espionage and its use targeted to companies in the Middle East. The flame virus
is a normal application, with the major element of sophistication residing in
its method of self propagation and detection avoidance.
Cybercriminals today, use similar applications. Their delivery mechanisms
are not as sophisticated as the one in Flame. They also do not have the ability
to self propagate and instead rely on tricking cybercitizens into downloading
such applications onto a desktop or mobile phone.
These applications are built for a purpose, just like Flame was built for
espionage. The main motive of cybercriminals is money, and therefore these
applications are normally used for a variety of frauds such a premium sms scams,
fraudulent cash transfers in internet banking and even espionage.
The relative ease at which users adopt new
technology allows cybercriminals devise new ways to beat existing security
systems. For instance, the growth of the
mobile apps stores provides a simple way to infiltrate malicious applications
onto smartphones. Cybercriminals have
already built applications to beat the two factor authentication provided by
banks. Once installed on your device, they proxy all requests to your Internet
banking site through a cybercriminal controlled computer (actually call centers)
allowing cyber criminals to make fraudulent transactions.
At the moment, there are no mature security products that can easily detect
such applications as a first line of defense. Cybercitizens need to be cautious
on what they download and where they download it form.
