Typosquatting – have you been affected?

Typosquatting – this is a new one on me. Apparently these typosquatters buy up domain names that are common misspellings of popular/big brand URLs.

So unsuspecting punters land on these sites, which are designed to – this is according to McAfee security analyst Greg Day, who may be inclined to paint a gloomy scenario: “generate click-through advertising revenue, lure unsuspecting consumers into scams, harvest email addresses in order to flood unsuspecting internet users with unwanted email and can even result in malware infections.”

So watch your typos, people.

Day offers some simple advice: if you’re not sure of the correct URL, use a search engine instead of guessing. He also says that because of these squatters, there are around 8,000 URLs using “iPhone’. Amazing.

But how much of a problem is this? I’ve never knowingly landed on one of these bogus sites, and I am a very carless typisst.

Have you ever been affected? – Let us know your experiences: please comment below

Oh, and latest news, the scammers are descending on Twitter now.

One thing for sure is that the global plague of internet spammers, scammers and crooks has made information security into a massive business.

Infosecurity Europe 2009 is a big show on at Earl’s Court in April. If you’re interested in this stuff, find out more at http://www.infosec.co.uk/