Dirty tricks during political campaigns are not new, but the proliferation of Internet and mobile devices has allowed these scammers to significantly upgrade their games. For example, it came to light last week that the Donald Trump campaign application was asking for an address book on his supporters’ phones.
The Trump app was not doing anything illegal. He was not even trying to hide what he was doing. The application searches for the user’s permission to download all contacts before doing so. However, both the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Privacy Information Center violated this practice.
Requesting permission for an app to run the app is common among mobile apps. The classic example is a flashlight application that searches for permission to access the address book on the phone. Why does the torch require an address book to work?
However, users of patience often greenlight redundant applications for such activities.
Lots of permission
“Users don’t care too much about what the applications demand,” said Stilak Leggier, deputy head of security engineering at Barlakuda Networks.
He told TechNewsWorld, “They needed three, four or five permissions before they could use something, so only most users click OK so they can continue their lives.” As a result, “applications need to ask for more permission from the people they really need to provide the service for which they were designed.”
Ligier states that for the most part, developers are not attempting to be harmful by taking their permissions. They will probably be planning ahead.
For example, when it was introduced, banking apps requested permission to use the device’s camera – although these early apps were not used for the camera. Finally, banks took advantage of the camera to allow users to deposit checks into their accounts, so camera permission was closely related to the program’s functionality.
“Developers prefer to get permission now, not later,” Lager said.
Trump cheats mule
Information-hungry applications targeted at political leaders during the election years are not merely technical tools. There are usually many scams that dominate the news.
In the current session, fraudsters use the Donald Trump name to lure people “getting rich while working at home”, Ligier noted. These scams usually seek to recruit people as “money mules” to bandits on the Internet outside the United States.
Others try to direct supporters of downside filters to a website that infects their computers with malware. One of these plans used a title about ISIS giving money to Hillary Clinton. When curious readers clicked on the story link, they were sent to a website, in which remote Trojans were implanted on their computers. RAT allows hackers to remotely control computers.
Several politically-developed scandals found their way to Stealthbit Technologies’ product manager Brad Bussey. One of them was a request from the Republican Party organization to request a donation in addition to his social security number.
He told TechNewsWorld, “The giant red flag must be raised to verify any kind of personally identifying information when an organization calls.”
Voter information scam
Bossi recalls that a company in the other stadium did a phone survey of the elections. For taking the survey, participants will be rewarded with a trip to the Bahamas.
“How can a survey company conduct a travel survey for the Bahamas to everyone?” He asked.
I asked him for a phishing email that came from the busy state government to update the voter information.
“The link seemed legitimate in the email – but as soon as I looked at the link in more detail, it would redirect me to a site with a different URL, but similar to the background of the actual site.” The site not only wants her personal information, but also wants a simple password that she can use on other sites.
He said, “People who are being cheated will enter three to five different passwords, assuming they forgot the password used before clicking the link” I forgot my password. ”
Clicking on the password link will cause the error status to forget my password on the site, taking Bussie to the “Server not found” page.
Visa waiver dispute
The proposed change in information collected from people who wish to enter the United States without a visa has caused some privacy services to stir. The proposal will contain questions about the applicant’s social media activity regarding the visa waiver application form.
According to the US Customs and Border Protection Notice published in the Federal Register, answers to questions will be optional, and the information given by the applicant will only be used to examine the application.
“The collection of social media data will enhance the current investigation process and provide greater clarity and clarity of potential rogue activity.
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