11/10/11

1) 7 Charged in Web Scam Using Ads 

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/10/technology/us-indicts-7-in-online-ad-fraud-scheme.html?_r=1&ref=technology 

2) A handful of men from Estonia were arrested as a result of swapping legitimate advertisements with those that would profit them. They also redirected clicks in search engines in order to receive sums of money.

3) Internet users and the owners of the various advertisements that were swapped in the scandal served as the stakeholders in the issue.

4) Security is a huge issue relating to the article because the arrested men were unauthorized to access or alter those ads.

5) Home and leisure would be an area of impact because internet users would come across the ads 

6) An advantage to the accusers of the issue would be that they collected around 14 million from their scam. 

7) A disadvantage to the issue would be the fact that it is unsafe to innocent internet users. 

8) I think its interesting that hundreds of thousands of computers could be affected by the malicious software without being noticed by its users. It makes me feel as though technology, despite being very helpful and vast, is being used more and more negatively.

9) A solution would be for more people and organizations to guard the internet and come up with more effective ways to pinpoint virus' and those that create them.