by Jim Hillier for Daves Computer Tips
Online shopping more dangerous than surfing porn?
Is this good news for the males out there? Maybe not so good news for the ladies?
According to a report recently published by networking giant Cisco; malware is more likely to come from advertisements on seemingly legitimate sites than from those sites traditionally considered as presenting a higher level of risk, such as sites hosting adult content or those dealing in illegal pharmaceuticals.
The findings presented by CISCO are the result of two globally conducted studies which uncovered several surprises. CISCO’s 2013 Annual Security Report rates online shopping sites at 21 times more likely to deliver a malicious package to your PC than a counterfeit software site… and search engines 27 times more likely. However, neither compare to online advertisements, which appear to be the riskiest of all, with ads being calculated at 182 times more likely to hit you with a virus than scouring the Net for porn.
Not that visiting porn sites should be considered safe, merely relatively so. Viewing porn online can still lead to viruses, and not the kind that cause a rash either.
According to Cisco, people who mix work-related and personal online activity via smartphones and other mobile devices are in the “high risk” bracket for security breaches. That’s particularly the case for what Cisco terms ‘Generation Y’ mobile device users who are described as constantly checking social media, email, and texts.
This excerpt is shared with permission from davescomputertips.com.
