Semi Off Topic: Keep Your Surfing Safe

There is a dearth of information dealing with nude hiking so when I come across an article or blog posting, myself, and I suspect most of you, would click the link and check the posting to see what they have to say. The Google Alert I got in my email reads (in part) "Hiking nude may be the ultimate experience of freedom ... nothing between you and the air ..." Good so far. Certainly an article that I'm going to read further. Problem here is that there is more than meets the eye when you click through to this link ...

The link does indeed follow through to a seemingly authentic blog posting . . . if you have time to read it because within seconds of loading the page you are redirected to a malicious web site designed to infect your computer. The only reason I got the above screen image is because I was prepared to stop the page loading before the redirect happened.

The actual post is a meaningless garble of words . . . just enough to fill a blog posting and make it seem authentic. I've noticed that searches and postings about nude recreation are increasingly being used by phishers and malicious hackers as a social-pretext to target people who may already feel nervous about even surfing to a site that has anything to do with nudism. You expect this sort of thing if you go checking out porn sites and, if we got our computer hopelessly infected after visiting a porn site would any of us admit it? I suspect the malware purveyors are expecting the same response from those who search for and click through on links leading to the subject of nude recreation such as nude hiking. Unfortunately, those who may have a genuine interest in learning about nudism are now being targeted by drive-by downloads.

This particular website of potential interest never gets loaded before the visitor is redirected and gets an alarming popup warning.

The popup warning as you are redirected to a malicious website

The warning takes you by surprise. However, it is not a genuine message. No matter where you click on this message (OK, Cancel, the X) you are taken to a good facsimile of a scan in progress.

The scan in progress with animated progress bar and 'found' infections

Of course, this is all a scam. There is no actual scanning of your computer taking place. they are simply trying to scare you and make your mouse-finger trigger happy for the next step . . . they are going to solve your problem.

"Remove All" or "Ignore"? Well, actually, you don't have the choice. Click either one and the download starts.

Fortunately, Firefox and the latest versions of Internet Explorer do not allow the download to progress without your permission. Just be warned that if you do save this file and then run it, you will be installing a particularly nasty piece of malware on your system. Surf safely. Don't fall for this kind of junk!