Your Monday porn alert

I know: Porn in a headline is a bit rich for a Monday morning. But given how easy it is to fall for these spam campaigns, I decided it was appropriate. My friend Graham Cluley at Sophos is warning us about a new campaign to promote hardcore porn websites.

From Cluley’s post in the Sophos Naked Security blog:

Emails have been spammed out purporting to have an adult video attached, using a variety of names. The subject lines can vary, but each has an HTML file attached with a woman’s name.

Juliet Morton represents new movie (JulietMorton.html)

Mona Fletcher returned with new movie (MonaFletcher.html)

Destiny Patterson shot unbelievable episode (DestinyPatterson.html)

Rachel Ruiz made fantastic video (RachelRuiz.html)

Destiny Ayala shows herself in clip (DestinyAyala.html)

Amber Nichols introduced her new video (AmberNichols.html)

The emails themselves are very basic, and are designed merely to lure unsuspecting recipients into clicking on the attached file. If you do click on the attached file, however, your browser will be redirected to one of a series of pornographic websites.

This seems pretty cut and dry. Give in to your curiosity over an advertised porn clip and you’re asking for trouble. The high and mighty side of me thinks you’re getting what you deserve if your clicking on porn.

The realistic side of me knows how easy it is to let your finger click the link faster than your brain can process what’s on the screen. You might remember my recent tale of falling for one of the oldest social engineering tricks in the book. I don’t go looking for porn. But there have been times where, after making a careless click of a URL, the porn came to me.

When that stuff appears on my screen, it scares the heck out of me. The pictures are gross enough, but what really makes me sick is the knowledge that I’ve just infected my machine. I do malware checks regularly, and fortunately my machine has stayed clean so far.

But having fallen for it before, I direct you to Graham’s post as a Monday-morning incentive to take care.