Twitter Overflows With Malware

One in 500 tweets links to malicious software, experts say

By Nick McMaster, Newser Staff

Posted Oct 30, 2009 3:35 PM CDT

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Twitter Overflows With Malware — Alex Lifschitz, of Los Angeles tweets from his on-campus apartment at the Rochester Institute of Technology in Henrietta, N.Y. on Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2009. (AP Photo/Don Heupel)

Twitter is the perfect malware delivery system, enabling cybercriminals to lure users with a quick tweet on a hot topic and a shortened URL that hides a shady website’s identity. One in 500 URLs posted on Twitter links to live malware, says Kaspersky international, which make a program that searches through tweets. A quarter of Twitter messages contain a URL, Kaspersky tells Wired, and half of those are generated by spammers and other Internet lowlifes.
(Read more malware stories.)