14 DAY TRIAL // Earlier this week, when the world learned about the death of Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez, I wrote a blog post to warn users of the scams that might leverage the event. Symantec has already started detecting malware-spreading emails that rely on this topic.
There are several malicious emails currently doing the rounds, each one of them attempting to lure unsuspecting internauts to websites, some hijacked and some newly-registered, that host malware.
In one example, the emails are entitled “Murdered Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez?” and they read something like this:
“Chavez was a leader who tried to free his people from the grip of people who will do anything to keep the consumer hostage. In the fall of 1998 oil was $15 a barrel and gasoline was 89 cents a gallon. I was called a dupe of Saddam by western media. We posted a video called A War On Children.”
This is actually an excerpt from an article published on March 6 by Terrance Nelson, vice chairman of American Indian Movement. Cybercriminals have taken his article and filled it with links that point to malware-serving websites.
Once again, I advise users to be extra cautious when receiving such emails.