Posts tagged security
Prepare for more Twitter attacks, only 21% of users are ‘true’ users
Mar 11th
Only 21% of Twitter users are ‘true Twitter users’ according to a new report from Barracuda Networks, does that mean that everyone else a) got bored or b) are hackers?
A true Twitter User as someone who has three main attributes:
· Has at least 10 followers
· Follows at least 10 people
· Has tweeted at least 10 times
The Twitter growth rate spiked at 21.17% in April 2009 due to what is known as the ‘Twitter Red Carpet Era’.
This falls between November 2008 and April 2009 and is the period of time during which a handful of ‘celebrities’ – including 27 of the top 50 and 48 of the top 100 most followed Twitter users – joined.
In the beginning of 2008, Twitter was growing approximately 0.31% per month. By November 2008, that growth increased to 1.95% per month.
After December 2008, Twitter’s growth exploded from nearly two percent per month, and rising to approximately three-to-four percent per month, before finally peaking at nearly 20% per month in April 2009.
At the end of the ‘Twitter Red Carpet Era,’ growth appears to have normalized, dropping back to 0.34% by December 2009.
Barracuda’s 2009 Annual Report, Twitter’s Red Carpet Era – Celebrities and Criminals’, reveals data from three areas: Twitter trends and tracking, Web threats and trends, and email spam and viruses.
The report drills down into 2009’s fastest growing social networking application Twitter, and reviews growth drivers, usage trends and the overall Twitter crime rate.
Barracuda Labs analyzed more than 19 million Twitter accounts, both legitimate and malicious, for frequency and content of tweets, user-to-user interactions, and each account’s overall activity level.
The report also revealed that 49% of Twitter users, and 48 of the top 100 most followed Twitter users, joined during the Twitter Red Carpet Era[2], indicating the significant impact celebrities have on the social networking landscape as they bring their real-world fans over to Twitter.
During the Twitter Red Carpet Era, the Twitter Crime Rate increased 66% and continued to escalate reaching 12% in October 2009, indicating one in eight accounts created was deemed to be malicious, suspicious or otherwise misused and subsequently suspended.
Social networking platforms like Twitter and Facebook provide a perfect opportunity for attackers to find their victims, leveraging what users assume to be a ‘safe’ environment. Attackers employ various techniques to build up their follower list, poison trending topic threads, or initiate other campaigns which can increase the visibility of their tweets, and therefore draw users in to suspicious sites, malicious downloads or other malevolent activity.
As social networks continue to gain momentum – and millions of users – there is no doubt that criminals will look to create more sophisticated and serious social engineering attacks against unsuspecting users.
Too sexy for Apple?
Feb 22nd
Believe it or not but Apple has finally got something wrong, upsetting customers – and no, I’m not talking about the iPad.
Apple has begun enforcing stricter policies around apps available from its app store in a move that could see some apps removed entirely.
While the tech giant has so far only removed adult-themed apps, some games have also been removed.
Techcrunch reports that no more applications with “overtly sexual content” will be allowed, however, the criteria in which apps on the Apple store will be measured remain unclear.
The policy is expected to alarm some developers, and like other attempts to censor internet content, could see some apps banned for no reason at all – or at least in a case of misunderstanding (think of how in India you can’t look up ‘sex discrimination laws’ because the search term ‘sex’ is banned.
The news has already prompted many scathing opinions and blog posts on Mac enthusiasts sites such as cultofmac.com and 9to5mac.com. Blog posts on the sites are warning developers to make sure they don’t feature any “sexy women in apps” deeming the bans “ridiculous”.
The pulling of apps is in response to what is being dubbed as “sexy apps”, which also includes porn.
The move comes at a rather convenient time, with many touting that the clean-up attempt is to ready the market for its iPad, which is due to hit stores next month.
The iPad is expected to be popular with schools – carrying textbooks.
It seems that no medium is safe from censorship these days. And it isn’t necessarily a bad thing. For years, the internet has known no or little inhibitions – there were no clear boundaries and anything and everything was available for download. We called it freedom. And until the internet giants got on board with censoring content available through their sites, there was no way to apply any laws on the world wide web as it isn’t confined to any one jurisdiction.
But the question is now, how much power should these ‘internet giants’ have over what content can and can’t be seen – and furthermore, what is too “sexy”?
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