George Clooney hijacked by malware on his way to the Oscars

Web surfers looking for information on the American actor George Clooney can find dangerous search results. If viewers click on one of the infected posted results, they can install a fake antivirus program on their computers. Jindrich Kubec, director of antivirus research at avast! discovered these sites during a midnight Google search. He was looking for information on whether George Clooney had previously won an Oscar and in which film.

Core Facts

Entering clooney oscar into the Firefox address bar can bring up infected websites
Clicking on the link redirects viewers through a series of hacked websites, malware redirector websites, and on to a fake antivirus program.
The internet is now the main vector for spreading malware and computer viruses, responsible for 85 percent of new infections.
avast! antivirus program helps prevent infections by scanning all visited sites and blocking those which have been infected or hijacked.

Quotes

Such sites look innocent. I was not looking for porn or warez. This is exactly the type of search which anyone around you could run and get infected from.

Jindrich Kubec, director of antivirus research at avast!

Company information

ALWIL Software is the maker of avast! the world’s most popular computer security program with over 100 million registered users. From its headquarters in the Czech Republic, ALWIL Software has developed the award-winning suite of avast! products and localized them into 33 languages. Further details about the company and its products can be found at http://www.avast.com.

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