More than a million users of social networking site
MySpace.com and other websites may have been infected with adware
spread by an internet banner advert.
The warning has come from internet security software company
iDefense, which said the advert was for a site called
Deckoutyourdeck.com.
The security company said the ad appeared in user profiles on
MySpace.com, which has around 70 million users.
The ad exploits a problem related to the way Microsoft’s
Internet Explorer browser handles WMF image files. Despite
Microsoft issuing a patch in January, over one million end-users
were infected with the adware, said iDefense.
Around 600 websites are thought to exploit the vulnerability and
end-users continue to become infected after visiting them. A visit
to a web page via the Deckoutyourdeck banner ad downloads a Trojan,
which then contacts multiple websites to download other unwanted
programs to the infected machine.
iDefense said the adware was being distributed from a server
located in Turkey.
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