WTF. You’d think after the humiliation and financial risks caused by social sharing site Blippy.com that we reported earlier this week, they would have either fixed it right, or shut the service down until they were certain everything was secure. But as reported on Blippy’s own blog, another four credit card numbers showed up in Google search results yesterday.

Possibly more disturbing is that Blippy is claiming only four individuals’ accounts showed up altogether, whereas other reputable sites like Mashable are reporting the number is closer to 200.

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Hundreds of credit cards exposed.

UPDATE: Blippy responds in their blog.

As reported by Mashable today Blippy, the online “service” that allows you to see what others have purchased and share your purchases, had an embarrassing and potentially dangerous security issue today. According to Mashable:

“Tipster Trey Copeland wrote to us with a link to results for the search: site:blippy.com +”from card”. That search returns results showing detailed purchase information for transactions. Each result highlights that there was a “debit card transaction” or “card transaction,” the amount spent, the specific location (address included) and the full card number.”

Mashable included a screenshot of Google’s search results, which show a number of compromised credit card numbers exposed. Don’t bother trying that search query: you’ll get an error message from Google instead.

The social media team I run at C-E has long speculated that this would happen. We couldn’t imagine why on earth anyone would share their purchases and trust all their credit card numbers to a social site that doesn’t sell anything.

TIP: As we warned a few weeks ago, there’s no reason to join Blippy. You do not ever need to share your purchases. It makes you a target. If you are a member, take immediate action to remove your financial information.

A generous nod to Gary Olson for the story.

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Wow, busy week for feds and hackers alike!

Mariposa Botnet netted and doused in formaldehyde

UPDATE: New details have emerged about the size and complexity of the Mariposa botnet. Apparently Mariposa dwarfed the attacks from Estonia and Georgia, and contained details on over 800,000 people.

Investigators in Spain shut down the Mariposa botnet, finding out the perps weren’t the sophisticated geniuses they expected.

“They’re not like these people from the Russian mafia or Eastern European mafia who like to have sports cars and good watches and good suits — the most frightening thing is they are normal people who are earning a lot of money with cybercrime,” said Cesar Lorenza, a captain with Spain’s Guardia Civil.

Blippy = TMI

For the life of me, I cannot figure out why anyone would use this service. Blippy allows you to post your purchases—in real time—to credit cards, ecommerce sites, etc., publicly and let your friends like or comment on your purchases. Seriously. Dancho Danchev’s post, Does Blippy really pose a security risk? is a must-read wake-up call for anyone using or planning to use this service. Hint: Don’t. Even Web Celebs like Leo LaPorte post rather sizable purchases on Blippy, making question whether or not he realizes what a target he is making himself into.

Botnets are ruining your inbox

Good lord. As if Mariposa wasn’t causing enough mischief, two other botnets, Grum and Rustock are accounting for nearly half of all spam, most of it Canadian pharma scams.

iPhones users targeted for scams

This scam is pretty ingenious in an evil way. According to the MarkMonitor blog,

“This recent attack also stands out because it utilizes some advanced technologies and suggests possible directions of future cybercriminal activity. First, the attack uses server-side logic that hides the phishing site unless it is accessed through the browser produced by the smartphone company. Second, the attack uses additional protective technology in the form of a fast-flux network, which hides the phishing site behind a dynamic network of ever-changing proxies. These two smart technologies demonstrate how cybercriminals continue to focus their efforts on making their attacks targeted, stealthy, and resilient.”

Choosy hackers choose PDF

According to a recent report of more than a trillion Web requests, PDFs were responsible for a staggering 80% of all exploits targeted at Adobe Reader vulnerabilities. The report (ironically itself a PDF) mentions that Flash-based attacks actually dipped from 40% to 18% in Q4 2009 while malicious PDFs rose from 56% to 80%.

More stories tomorrow. Lots going on! What do you think of Blippy? Too much info? Let us know!

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