Jessica Mauboy tops McAfee’s list of dangerous Australians online
SHE’S proven herself a hit as a singer and actor. And now Jessica Mauboy has risen to the top of our most dangerous celebrities online.
SINGER and actor Jessica Mauboy can now add “most dangerous celebrity” with a computer security report warning she is the riskiest Australian to search for online.
McAfee released its annual list of risky celebrities looking at the abuse of a star’s name by a hacker looking to spread spyware, spam, viruses, malware and phishing attacks.
Perhaps propelled by her appearance in the Eurovision Song Contest and the closing ceremony of the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Mauboy jumped from third position to first place on the list no celebrity wants to be on.
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Other notable climbers up the dangerous ranks include Delta Goodrem and Keith Urban while Kylie Minogue’s gig as a job on The Voice didn’t stop her sliding down the list from number one last year to number four.
McAfee Pacific chief technology officer Sean Duca said the recent iCloud hack highlighted the appeal for some people of searching the internet for information about celebrities.
“Cyber criminals follow where the big interests go towards, whether it’s been a disaster taking place or, as in this case, celebrities,” Mr Duca said.
He said people were being lured by the big names to websites which could be trying to exploit a weakness in their browser to infect their computer or encourage people to click on a link that appeared to be a file containing photos of the celebrity but contained an infected file.
“With the amount of the vulnerability that tends to be popping up these days, whether it be in the operating system or whether it be in the web browsers, just by clinking on a link that takes you to a malicious web site can sometimes exploit that vulnerability.”
The top 10 most dangerous Australian celebrities to search for:
1 Jessica Mauboy
2 Delta Goodrem
3 Keith Urban
4 Kylie Minogue
5 Russell Crowe
6 Mel Gibson
7 Guy Pearce
8 Jesse Spencer
9 Eric Bana
10 Rebel Wilson
Source: McAfee
The top 10 most dangerous global celebrities to search for
1 Jimmy Kimmel
2 Armin van Buuren
3 Ciara
4 Flo Rida
5 Bruce Springsteen
6 Blake Shelton
7 Britney Spears
8 Jon Bon Jovi
9 Chelsea Handler
10 Christina Aguilera
Source: McAfee
To avoid falling into a pit of malware, common sense precautions include:
* BEWARE of third-party links. If you want to watch Jimmy Kimmel videos, go straight to the network’s site.
* DON’T download video from suspect sites.
* BE aware that the highest virus-prone search terms include “free download”. Hackers and virus makers know people use that term frequently and exploit that.
* BE aware of phishing and don’t provide details to a website just because you’ve had an email that appears to be legitimate.
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