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McAfee, INC. names Jessica Biel the most dangerous celebrity in cyberspace

August 2009 by McAfee

McAfee Jessica Biel has overtaken Brad Pitt as the most dangerous
celebrity to search in cyberspace, according to Internet security company McAfee, Inc.. For the third year in a row, McAfee researched Hollywood’s glamorous stars and pop
culture’s most famous people to reveal the riskiest celebrities on the Web. McAfee’s latest
report found that searches for Barack or Michelle Obama posed a lesser threat compared to
others.

Fans searching for “Jessica Biel” or “Jessica Biel downloads,” “wallpaper,” “screen savers,”
“photos” and “videos” have a one in five chance of landing at a Web site that’s tested positive
for online threats, such as spyware, adware, spam, phishing, viruses and other malware.
Searching for the latest celebrity news and downloads can cause serious damage to one’s
personal computer.

Every day, cybercriminals use A-listers’ names and images, like Kim Kardashian and Rihanna,
to lure surfers searching for the latest stories, screen savers and ringtones to sites offering free
downloads laden with malware.

Beyonce – Number Two for Two Years Counting

Pop music phenom Beyoncé maintained her number two position for the second consecutive
year, setting McAfee’s record as the overall most frequent, highly-ranked celebrity in the top
five.

Young Hollywood – Just as Dangerous to Search as They Are Famous
Young Hollywood starlets (and popular tabloid subjects) Miley Cyrus, Ashley Tisdale and Lindsay Lohan all edged out Heidi Montag and Jessica Alba who appeared on last year’s list.

They also ranked higher than other young personalities including “Twilight” stars Robert Pattinson (#30) and Kristen Stewart (#20), the Jonas Brothers (#23), Taylor Swift (#16), Lauren
Conrad (#25) Vanessa Hudgens (#17) and Zac Efron (#21).
Beware of Dangerous Duos
Hollywood stand outs Megan Fox and Angelina Jolie have more in common than their
appearance and successful careers – they tied as the eighth most dangerous celebrities on the
Web. Newlyweds Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen appeared nearly side-by-side in the fourth
and sixth positions, respectively, proving that hackers target those who are most in the
headlines.

Who’s Safer: The Obamas Surprisingly, the U.S. President and First Lady are not among the most risky public figures to
search; Barack and Michelle Obama ranked in the bottom-third of this year’s results, at #34
and #39, respectively.

McAfee compiled its third annual list using McAfee® SiteAdvisor® technology for celebrity
names that produce the largest number of risky sites and overall risk percentage, when
searched on the Web. The top 15 celebrities include:

Position Celebrity

1 Jessica Biel – Major buzz about her figure and high-profile relationship with
Justin Timberlake makes Jessica Biel an easy target for spammers and
hackers. When “Jessica Biel screensavers” was searched, almost half of the
sites were identified as containing malicious downloads with spyware,
adware and potential viruses.

2 Beyoncé – Beyonce tops the MTV Video Music Award nominee list and
McAfee’s results as the most frequent, highly-ranked celebrity. Inputting
“Beyoncé ringtones” into a search engine yielded a dangerous Web site
linking to a distributor of adware and spyware.

3 Jennifer Aniston – Hollywood’s favorite leading lady should be Googled
with caution. More than 40% of sites that were searched for “Jennifer
Aniston screensavers” contained nasty viruses, including one called the
“FunLove virus.”

4 Tom Brady – The New England Patriot seems to attract many fans who
want a free download of the athlete in action, but not the Trojan that comes
with it, as identified by McAfee SiteAdvisor.

5 Jessica Simpson – Jessica Simpson is as dangerous to search online as
she is famous. Searching for “Jessica Simpson videos” can mislead
unsuspecting surfers to sites with potentially damaging downloads.

6 Gisele Bundchen – The world’s highest-paid supermodel is a popular
target for cybercriminals. A search for “Gisele Bundchen photos” can direct
users to red-ranked sites that breached browser security in McAfee’s tests.

7 Miley Cyrus – Cybercriminals are using Web sites related to Miley Cyrus’
image to link to other harmful sites containing spyware.

8 Megan Fox, Angelina Jolie – Both tabloid fixture Megan Fox and American
icon Angelina Jolie resulted in an equal number of risky download Web
sites, proving cybercriminals are in the business of capitalizing on the
world’s most famous faces.

9 Ashley Tisdale – The “High School Musical” star is a popular search term
when it comes to searching for screensavers. A host of screensaver Web
sites contained numerous malware-laden downloads.

10 Brad Pitt – Appearing in the top spot last year, Brad Pitt fell towards the
bottom of this year’s list, resulting in a few less, but just as dangerous, red
and yellow-ranked Web sites.

11 Reese Witherspoon – Risky Web sites were identified when searching for
“Reese Witherspoon” and “Reese Witherspoon photos” promoting free files
with hidden malware.

12 Britney Spears – McAfee SiteAdvisor found a single site promoting free
Britney Spears wallpaper that was embedded with more than 50 potentially
infected downloads.

13 Rihanna – Free Rihanna ringtones are some of the most sought after, but
some shady vendors mislead those who subscribe by gathering and selling
their personal information.

14 Lindsay Lohan – McAfee SiteAdvisor flagged Lindsay Lohan screen saver
sites as offering a combined 50+ free screen savers infected with Trojans,
viruses and spyware.

15 Kim Kardashian – The biggest reality star in recent months is now
susceptible to Internet lurkers too. A search for Kim Kardashian wallpaper
and screen savers generated numerous downloads veiled with malware.

“Cybercriminals are star watchers too – they latch onto popular celebrities to encourage the
download of malicious software in disguise,” said Jeff Green, senior vice president of McAfee’s
Product Development & Avert Labs. “Consumers’ obsession with celebrity news and culture is
harmless in theory, but one bad download can cause a lot of damage to a computer.”

McAfee security experts urge consumers to buy comprehensive security software such as
McAfee Total Protection, McAfee Internet Security and McAfee VirusScan Plus and to keep
your subscriptions current. In each of McAfee’s suites, consumers can practice safe surfing
with McAfee SiteAdvisor, which uses intuitive red, yellow and green rating icons to
communicate a Web site’s safety level before the site is even accessed.


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