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Football star David Beckham is the latest victim of a worrying scam by online fraudsters using the popular social networking phenomenon, Twitter, as a vehicle for spam advertising.

According to Candid Wueest, senior threat researcher at Symantec, the fraudsters create a fake Twitter account, often in the name of a celebrity, and then attempt to become followers of legitimate Twitter account holders.

“In this case, the false David - an online Chinese retailer - followed over a thousand accounts with a single common link – the account name contains the word ‘candid’.

“The credibility of the fake account is bolstered by other fraudulent accounts linking back to it and by cross-following legitimate Twitter accounts, which have been hacked,” he says.

Wueest confirms that this type of malicious activity is fast becoming common practice and adds that the rogue tweets often include short links pointing to infected websites.

To read more about this threat, check out Becks loves me, or learn more about malicious online activity at 2010Netthreat.com.

Football star David Beckham is the latest victim of a worrying scam by online fraudsters using the popular social networking phenomenon, Twitter, as a vehicle for spam advertising. According to Candid Wueest, senior threat researcher at Symantec, the fraudsters create a fake Twitter account, often in the name of a celebrity, and then attempt to become followers of legitimate Twitter account holders.

“In this case, the false David - an online Chinese retailer - followed over a thousand accounts with a single common link – the account name contains the word ‘candid’.

“The credibility of the fake account is bolstered by other fraudulent accounts linking back to it and by cross-following legitimate Twitter accounts, which have been hacked,” he says. Wueest confirms that this type of malicious activity is fast becoming common practice and adds that the rogue tweets often include short links pointing to infected websites.

“This proves that spammers are keeping abreast of new technologies. Twitter users are advised to carefully check out the details of all prospective followers and never to respond to ‘suspicious’ direct messages,” he says. To read more about this threat, check out Becks loves me, or learn more about malicious online activity at 2010Netthreat.com.