Some people fish for compliments, others phish for info - sensitive, personal info at that. It's no surprise, then that players of a game as popular as Blizzard's World of Warcraft should also become targets of these "phishermen." Fortunately, Symantec has a word of warning regarding one of the latest scams out there. Turn to the full article after the jump for something phishy.

Heads up iPhone owners! Symantec has just identified and confirmed the iPhone firmware 1.1.3 prep application as the first ever Trojan virus targetting the mobile device.

Although it does not pose a big threat, the application can still remove files on the iPhone rendering valid programs such as Sendfile and Erica's Utilities useless. More information regarding the virus in the full article.

In the world of organized crime, nothing is exempt as long as it will further their schemes. In line with this thinking, Symantec warned authorities with the possibility of criminals using online games such as World of Warcraft and Second Life for money laundering purposes. That's another form of online crime apart from piracy.

The two online games' use of microtransaction business models in exchanging virtual items for money makes it possible for organized criminals to "open several thousand MMOG accounts. Each could be used to trade with other players in the purchase or sale of in-game assets, the funds from which would ultimately be withdrawn from the accounts," according to the Internet Security Threat Report from Symantec.

With those myriad of accounts going through millions of transactions, tracing the true source of the accounts will ultimately become near-impossible.

Aside from money laundering, several online games are also being used to spread malicious software in the guise of downloadable updates. Unfortunately, some gamers often disable their security systems in their computers to optimize performance while playing, leaving them open for infections or attacks.

China is most affected by MMOG software attacks, with about 74 percent of the attacks directed towards the country. About 84 percent of Gampass attacks, one of the most malicious trojan codes, originated from China as well.

While there's not much you can do to make sure you account will stay away from money laundering, you can protect your computer from getting infected by making sure your anti-virus and firewalls stay on while you're playing.

Fellow Skype users out there had better keep a look out for the new worm circulating the network. The worm is in typical IM disguise, masquerading as a harmless message with a jpg file. Once clicked, the worm will begin to spread itself through the contact list, repeating the process all over again in another computer.

The message comes in several versions but all of them attack with the same worm. Skype has named the virus Ramex.a but Symantec has named it Pykspa.d. However you want to call it, the worm attacks with the same .scr file which periodically runs a series of malware on the infected computer.

Skype has given instructions on removing the worm but it involves tampering with the Windows registry, which could be tricky, if not treacherous. Some users may end up doing more damage than the worm, so it's not exactly a popular type of vaccine. Symantec is currently investigating the new worm but there's no definite news on an antivirus yet.

As the Mac OS started gaining popularity, it also started to become a larger target for viruses. Now it seems that next gen consoles which have evolved enough to support online gaming and browsing might also attract unwanted attention from malicious programmers.

Symantec, the company behind the Norton AntiVirus Series, has recently discovered that the Nintendo Wii and the Sony PlayStation 3 are vulnerable to viruses and phishing attacks. Ollie Whitehouse, software architect for Symantec, explained to Tech.co.uk that they found the vulnerability by subjecting the Wii to a vulnerability found on Windows and Macs using Adobe Flash Player.

Their point was that if one platform is vulnerable, the same vulnerability will be found "to some extent" on other platforms, even consoles. Now that the consoles freely access the Internet, they are susceptible to web related problems such as viruses and phishing attacks.

Symantec pointed out that the Nintendo Wii has no protection from such malicious attacks. Whitehouse explains further: "In terms of how bad it could get, it's conceivable at least in the short term that phishing attacks could become commonplace via a games console browser. The Wii lends itself very well to that."

He also predicts that malicious code would appear within the next two years, and probably be a commonplace problem within five years. He also explains how Microsoft's Xbox 360 is likely to be more protected than the PS3 and the Wii because of security measures implemented in all games and software for the console.

Do you have a lot of MP3 files stored on your laptops and notebooks? If you do, you might want to be careful on docking removable flash drives on them because there is currently a low-risk malware that goes after music files prowling the net.

One, now, couldn't help but wonder as to why the creators of this worm would come up with such program. Senior technology consultant Graham Cluley from security vendor Sophos PLC had this to say, "The authors of this worm are more likely to be teenage mischief makers than the organized criminal gangs we typically see authoring financially-motivated malware these days".

The technology assistant then reminded the public how viruses spread from computer to computer decades ago through floppy disks. Cluley commented that the objective for having the malware spread using flash drives is probably to "bypass e-mail filters and Web gateway filters that block malicious software".

Furthermore, computer software company Symantec Corporation now refers to this malware as W32.Deletemusic. It added that the program copies itself to all drives on a PC, not to mention it creating an autorun file to start itself whenever a user accesses a drive.

W32.Deletemusic affects PC units running on Windows 2000, 95, 98, Me, NT, Server 2003, XP and Vista.

More bug news about Apple, and this time it's about Mac OS X. It seems that a recent addition of an exploit to the infamous Metasploit hacking framework has upped the level of threat that an unpatched bug in Samba currently poses to the system it's installed on, as well as on its user. This warning came directly from Symantec Corp., the company expressing concern over what appears to be apathy on Apple's part.

Of course, the people behind Samba had already done their homework on the bug itself. In fact, the patch that resolved the vulnerability in the open-source file and print-sharing program was produced and distributed by the Samba community exactly the day it was announced. That fixes things for Samba, but not for the Mac OS X itself.

So what's the unpatched bug, really? When turning on the Mac OS X's Windows Sharing feature, it also activates Samba. Keep in mind, Samba is not just a Mac OS X exclusive file-sharing software, as it's also used by PC and Linux users. This in itself is already a very wide opening in terms of security for the Mac OS X, as users can easily take advantage of the exploit and gain root access. Of course, this "opening" is very easily closed, as users only need to disable Windows Sharing - but it's more of a temporary stopgap rather than an actual remedy.

Apple's products may have few bugs and exploits, but by no means is it an excuse to not stay on your toes when root access security is concerned. That aside, let's hope for some timely measures coming from Apple itself. Updates as we get them.

Making its rounds on Digg is a website showing off the additional details of the security exploit on flash players. Earlier, it was speculated that such a vulnerability could very well be used to enable homebrew on the Nintendo Wii, but for the most part, it's simply being used as a tool to bug out your flash players (and consequently, your Wii).

As explained by Liam OMurchu over at Symantec, a specially crafted flash video is all that's required to freeze your console. Because it takes a flash video to freeze your Nintendo Wii (as well your PCs and Macs), it seems that anyone malicious enough to want to annoy people can simply upload the bug-inducing vid on a video upload site to cause havoc.

It's already got a fix for computers, but the Wii has yet to get its own. Needless to say, be careful where you surf if you're using your console to do so.

In any case, you can check out the video below to see its effects on the Wii (at the 1:32 mark). Don't worry though: it's a Symantec-made video that only shows the effects, but isn't actually the bugged vid itself. For more information, feel free to click on the read link below.

Yes, this is yet another news regarding the growingly rampant WoW accounts hacking. And unfortunately, you guys just might have to be paranoid a little bit more.

Roger Thompson, CTO of Exploit Prevention Labs, warns that the gangs are still "incredibly active, and it's a good exploit." By now, you should know the hackers' MO already. But if not, it's never too late to find out. Basically, these hackers infect those sites that WoW players usually visit with keylogging software. Now, the sites need not be WoW-related, but is frequented by avid gamers. With the software installed in the computers, the hackers are then able to spy on keystrokes, and ultimately, to steal WoW accounts from unsuspecting players.

As to why WoW accounts are the ones targeted, "The guys working out how to do it are WoW players. We're pretty sure we know who (most of them) are: a couple of Chinese college students, and it turns out they're interested in WoW." They also suspect a Russian gang to be in on it as well.

For their part, Blizzard has already addressed the problem by giving a shout out to the gamers via their official website. "[An] important means of protecting your account information is keeping your system up-to-date. For instance, installing the latest Windows security patch is a good way to avoid exploits designed to steal your login and password details."

The thing is, it's most likely that this pilferage of WoW accounts will remain in the community because the players themselves do tend to be lax regarding their software security. Apart from this is the fact that there is an existing market out there for the stolen goods. Says Symantec's senior manager for the security response team, "People are willing to buy on the black market. If players themselves were not willing to go outside the games to improve their characters, then there wouldn't be such a need."

So at the end of the day, this security problem is still -- er -- a problem. While there still are no clear-cut mechanisms on how the WoW community can actually police these hackers, as well as a well-founded check and balance mechanism to avert these kinds of incidents, each player would just have to be extra vigilant that these folks with malicious intents on your accounts don't tread on yours.

"The moral of the story is that if you patch, you're safe," concludes Thompson. "If not, be afraid, be very afraid. Complacency is the enemy."

You remember that security advisory both issued by Microsoft and the World of Warcraft about Windows' vulnerability? Hackers are apparently taking advantage of how Windows handles moving cursors and are now targeting WoW account information.

Microsoft released a patch to counter the problem that surfaced late last month. Investigators have discovered that hackers can insert their malicious codes via a number of ways. They can create a dummy site (for phishing), have other sites host the code, or hack into sites and insert the codes into it (preferrably a popular one). It was reported that a Chinese hacking group cashed in on the animated cursor flaw by hacking into the Superbowl site and inserted the spyware there.

The analysts learned that the hackers are focusing their attention toward World of Warcraft account information - which is now surprisingly more expensive than credit card information. According to Symantec, a credit card can be bought at US$ 6 while WoW account info rings in at US$ 10. When you consider rare items and gold sales, it could go up some more. Much more.

The patch to remedy the flaw was released last April 3. Be sure to run automatic updates or download the patch manually. You can't be too careful.