Facebook, Twitter to Face More Hacker Attacks in 2010

A U.S.-based Web security firm says it expects social networking Web sites to face increased hacker attacks in the new year, but foresees overall progress in the fight against cybercrime.

In its 2010 Threat Predictions report, issued this week, McAfee Labs said sites like Facebook and Twitter have given cybercriminals new technologies to work with and new centers of activity that can be exploited.

McAfee said users of social networking sites will become "more vulnerable to attacks that distribute rogue applications across their networks" and that cybercriminals will take advantage of users trusting their "friends" to get them to click on links they might otherwise treat cautiously.

The California-based firm says it also expects to see increased threats to banking security and a rise in e-mail attachments delivering malicious software, or malware.

McAfee says 2010 will also bring changes in the world of "botnets," armies of infected computers used to spread malware. The firm says law enforcement has already been successful in taking down botnets and predicts many more successes in the pursuit of cybercriminals in 2010.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP.