Malware Fads: Osama Bin Laden's Execution Facebook Viruses

On May 1, 2011, the United States president, Barack Obama, pronounced terrorist leader Osama bin Laden dead. Soon afterward, people were clamoring to see photos of the terrorist's dead body. Terrorists of another kind, hackers, created a virus that targets people on the social networking site Facebook. This Facebook virus is called Osama Bin Laden's Execution Facebook Virus.

What made this Facebook virus particularly devious is that it played on people's desires for retribution for the September 11 attacks and distributed this malware through a popular social networking site. Facebook (FB) users would see a post on their wall or on a friend's wall claiming that they could see pictures of Bin Laden's dead body if they clicked on the link provided in the post.

Of course, since the United States government never released photos of the terrorist after his death, the post is a hoax. Clicking the link would download malware to the Facebook user's computer.

Another, similar Bin Laden Facebook virus started around the same time but packed a bigger punch for unsuspecting FB users. These devious posts proclaimed, "Bin Laden Death Video," "Bin Laden EXECUTION Video! Yes it's REAL!" along with similar claims. What made these posts extremely convincing was the realistic image that accompanied them. This picture of a battered, bruised and dead Bin Laden was used by several legitimate news papers, so it was obviously pretty convincing, and not only to Facebook virus victims. Later, it was revealed that the photo was a picture of the terrorist from 2008 combined with a photo of a dead man with similar skin tones.

When users clicked on the link to the video, they were taken to a survey that would supposedly prove that they were human before allowing them to see the video. This survey was actually a scam to collect personal information from unsuspecting users.

The scam also offered free games or downloads. By accepting these downloads, people opened up their computers to infection by malware, Trojans and viruses.

As if all this wasn't enough, the final slap in the face for the people who clicked these links is that the Facebook virus post would appear on their walls for their friends to stumble across as well, and so on.

The best way to defend yourself against these types of scams is to be in the know. People who had read recent news would have known that no photos or videos of Bin Laden's dead body had ever been released, which would have lead them to the conclusion that these Facebook posts were hoaxes.

Another good defense against Facebook viruses is to check and see where the post came from. Each FB post has the name of the person who posted the link at the very top. If you don't know the person, don't trust the link. Even if it appears to be a friend's post, don't click on it if it seems suspicious, because Facebook virus posts often originate from compromised accounts and trick users by seeming like friends' posts.

Facebook viruses are a common part of social networking. Even careful people can be tricked. That's why it's important to have antivirus software running on your computer at all times. Your antivirus software may save your computer from the next malware fad.

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