Bill Cosby has NOT died, but rumours fuel hacker scareware attack

Graham Cluley
@gcluley

A hoax has spread rapidly over the internet this weekend, claiming that comedian Bill Cosby has died at the age of 72. However, hunting for information about the story can lead your computer into a nasty malware infection.

In what appears to be the latest example of hackers jumping on the coat-tails of a hot trending search topic, criminals have created malicious webpages which pretend to be a CNN news report about Bill Cosby’s supposed death – but really display fake warnings about security problems on your computer.

These poisoned webpages are appearing high in search engine results – bringing the hackers a steady stream of traffic in the form of unsuspecting computer users searching for information about Bill Cosby.

The warning messages attempt to scare unsuspecting users into downloading a fake anti-virus program onto their computers and possibly handing over their credit card details.

The incorrect rumours about Bill Cosby dying appear to have started on Twitter, with…

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

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Graham Cluley is a veteran of the anti-virus industry having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent security analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of computer security, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter at @gcluley, on Mastodon at @[email protected], or drop him an email.