Security news
Security news5 August 2008
Four years jail for voyeur hacker who spied via webcam Computer users reminded of importance of securing their PCs
The jailed man used a Trojan horse to spy on his young victim via her webcam.
Experts at SophosLabs™, Sophos's global network of virus, spyware and spam analysis centers, are reminding computer users about the importance of properly securing PCs, following news that a man has been jailed for prey upon young women via internet webcams.
The 47-year-old man from Cyprus has been given a four year jail sentence after hacking a teenage girl's webcam, in order to take illicit pictures of the young woman in her bedroom.
The man, who has not been named but is a computer technician in Nicosia, spied on the then 17-year-old girl through her webcam after infecting her PC with a spyware Trojan horse that he sent her as an email attachment.
The middle-aged hacker took compromising photos of the teenager while she was alone in her bedroom for an extended period of time without her knowledge, and then threatened to send the pictures to her email contacts unless she posed naked in front of the webcam. The girl refused and the police were contacted, resulting in the man's arrest in 2005.
"Most spyware is designed to steal your identity, your passwords, your banking information - but it is just as easy to program a Trojan horse to take over your webcam," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos. "This case highlights that as well as malware being used for financial gain, it can also be used by voyeurs. Everyone needs to treat computer security as paramount importance to ensure they do not fall victim to an internet blackmailer or peeping tom."
Sophos notes that there have been other cases in the past where hackers have taken remote control of innocent users' webcams in order to spy upon them.
In early 2005, Spanish authorities fined a student who captured movie footage from unsuspecting users, and arrested a 37-year-old man who spied on victims via a webcam while stealing banking information. The following year, Adrian Ringland, from the British town of Ilkeston, Derbyshire, was sentenced to jail for ten years after admitting posing as a minor on internet chatrooms and using spyware to take explicit photographs via children's webcams. Earlier this year, a 27-year-old Canadian man was charged with using spyware to take over the webcams of women as young as 14 and coercing them into posing naked for him.
- Find out more about how to protect children from online threats at www.getsafeonline.org
- Find out about the Virtual Global Taskforce - a group of police forces working around the world to fight online child abuse
Business employees can fall victim too
Sophos experts note that the problem of poorly-defended PCs does not just affect young home users, but workers too.
"These attacks are not just a problem for youngsters," continued Cluley. "Home and remote workers use computers often equipped with webcams and may have lax protection in place. The danger of people using a 'work' computer for non-approved use such as instant messaging chat are well documented. Companies should deploy application control technology to set a strict policy as to which programs, such as chat clients, can be used by their employees."
Sophos recommends that companies protect their email gateways with a consolidated solution to defend against viruses, spyware and spam, as well as secure their desktop and servers with automatically updated protection. Sophos's Application Control functionality - which is integrated into Sophos Endpoint Security and Control - puts the power in system administrator’s hands to control usage of many different types of programs amongst their users.
About Sophos
Sophos enables enterprises all over the world to secure and control their IT infrastructure. Sophos's network access control, endpoint, web and email solutions simplify security to provide integrated defenses against malware, spyware, intrusions, unwanted applications, spam, policy abuse, data leakage and compliance drift. With over 20 years of experience, Sophos protects over 100 million users in nearly 150 countries with its reliably engineered security solutions and services. Recognized for its high level of customer satisfaction and powerful yet easy-to-use solutions, Sophos has received many industry awards, as well as positive reviews and certifications.
Sophos is headquartered in Boston, US and Oxford, UK. More information is available at www.sophos.com
