Advertising Viruses? 0
The Wall Street Journal reported that a number of websites have fallen victim to “malicious criminal hackers” embedding malware within the websites advertising systems. According to the article, Web say there has been an increase in the number of ads harboring malware as the economy has “soured and publishers, needing to boost their ad revenues, outsource more of their ad-space sales.” Websites sell their ad space publicly through a number of ad networks and that ad network can ultimately sell the space again or outsource to ad exchanges.
But if websites such as AmericanIdol.com, FoxNews.com and Major League Baseball’s MLB.com have been affected, is anyone safe from these types of attacks? As the internet continues to expand increasing the users and as a result the advertising space, the risk of individuals’ online safety also increases.
Ad technology companies and Internet companies claim they are making efforts to boost the security of their systems, but as Ben Edelman, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School who researches Web security issues suggests “The system is only as safe as its least secure members,”. So how do we know we are really safe?