Malvertising Takes Advanced Approach
Malvertising, or malicious software that is distributed through advertisements, is taking an advanced approach. According to Lifars, the cyber criminal group AdGholas, have sophisticated their attack approach leaps and bounds.
First, their malicious ad does not infect your PC right away. It is designed to start obtaining data that they can use to determine their attack approach. This data includes whether or not the PC user is running an anti-virus solution, as well as if the computer is a virtual machine. The ad also looks for a known information leakage vulnerability within the web browser. The malicious advertisement does all of this, without the PC user even clicking on the ad.
From the information they obtain, they determine which computers they will infect with the malware.
Fortunately, malvertising can be avoided with the implementation of adblocking technology. Some security solutions, like PC Matic, offer an adblocker bundled with their PC protection. If your security solution does not offer adblocking technology, it is encouraged you find an anti-virus solution that includes it with their product, or purchase an adblocker on its own.
