New Twitter worm targets celebrities

18.04.2009
A worm referencing celebrities such as Ashton Kutcher and Oprah Winfrey is rapidly spreading across microblogging site Twitter, security firm Sophos said on Friday.

The worm hacks into Twitter profiles and automatically sends unauthorized Twitter status updates to contacts from the hacked accounts. Users who look at infected profiles are then automatically infected, and unauthorized posts are automatically sent to their contacts.

Possibly infected accounts are creating posts that mention the Twitter profile names of celebrities such as Kutcher and Winfrey, said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos. If the celebrities see the posts and click on the profile names they came from, the infection could spread faster, he said.