Actress 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 consecutive year, McAfee surveyed which A-list celebrity was the riskiest to track on the Internet after Pitt topped the list last year and Paris Hilton came in first in 2007.

Biel, 27, who shot to fame in the TV show “7th Heaven” and most recently starred in “Easy Virtue,” was deemed the most dangerous, with fans having a one-in-five chance of landing at a website that has tested positive for online threats, such as spyware, adware, spam, phishing, and viruses.

“Cybercriminals are star watchers too — they latch onto popular celebrities to encourage the download of malicious software in disguise,” McAfee’s Jeff Green said in a statement.

“Consumers’ obsession with celebrity news and culture is harmless in theory, but one bad download can cause a lot of damage to a computer.”

“Every day, cybercriminals use celebrities’ 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,” the statement added.

Coming second in the list for the second year running was pop star Beyonce, with McAfee finding that putting “Beyonce ringtones” into a search engine yielded a dangerous website linking to a distributor of adware and spyware.

Actress Jennifer Aniston was third, with more than 40 percent of the Google search results for “Jennifer Aniston screensavers” containing nasty viruses.

Young Hollywood stars 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 who came 30th and Kristen Stewart who was 20th, the Jonas Brothers, Taylor Swift, Lauren Conrad, Vanessa Hudgens and Zac Efron.

Megan Fox and Angelina Jolie tied as the eighth most dangerous celebrities on the Web while newlyweds Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen came in fourth and sixth respectively.

However, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama, who have featured on most celebrities list this year, were not at the top of risky public figures to search.

The Obamas ranked in the bottom-third of this year’s results, at No. 34 and No. 39 respectively.

Brad Pitt came 10th in the list this year.

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MILLIONS of computers around the world could go into meltdown on April 1 because of a deadly virus.

The Windows worm called Conficker could give a hacker unrestricted access to every infected machine on the planet.

And the aggressive bug could be hiding on your PC at home right now, waiting to kick in.

For the hackers, it’s like having a virtual army at their fingertips.

The criminals behind it have the power to launch a tidal wave of junk emails, bringing computers grinding to a halt.

They could also plunder information, including your bank details.

But the truth is that the best techie brains in the business just don’t know exactly what the hackers have in mind.

Infected:

Virus expert Mikko Hypponen, from the firm F-Secure, said: “It is scary thinking about how much control a hacker could have over all these computers. They would have access to millions of machines.”

Microsoft, who developed the Windows computer operating system, have slapped a £175,000 bounty on whoever is responsible, so far without success.

The sophisticated Conficker bug — also known as Downadup or Kido — targets systems via the web and can be spread on memory sticks.

More than nine million computers were infected at the bug’s peak last month.

And if Conficker is still on your system come Wednesday, you could be in trouble.

Once inside your PC, it sets up files and starts downloading information from a controlling “boss” server.

Finding that website and the mastermind behind it all is like looking for a needle in a haystack.

That is because the bug creates hundreds of bogus addresses every day to put investigators off the scent.

The infected PCs then form a network and “talk” to each other, updating and evolving.

The bug even attacks anti-virus software and other files on your computer to strengthen its position.

And it resets “restore” points, making recovery of your old system even harder.

The first of three Conficker strains was discovered in November last year.

A second, more aggressive strain followed in December and a third this month. This contains the all-important April 1 trigger.

Trigger :

To avoid infection, Windows users must download a special free update “patch” from the Microsoft website. But that isn’t enough — you also need good anti-virus software too.

Many businesses around the world are thought also to be at risk after failing to update systems.

Graham Cluley, from computer security firm Sophos, warned: “Microsoft did a good job of updating people’s home computers.

“But the virus continues to infect businesses that have ignored the update.”

He also stressed the need for strong passwords on your computer, adding: “If users are using weak passwords — 12345, QWERTY etc — then the virus can crack them.”

F-Secure’s Mikko warned potential problems with Conficker would be highlighted wildly before April 1.

But he said he didn’t foresee an attack, despite the fears and mystery surrounding the problem.

He said: “There’s always hype — just think of previous cases.

“There is not going to be a ‘global virus attack’. We don’t know what they are planning to do, if anything.

“I think the machines that are already infected might do something new on April 1.”

Let’s hope, for everyone’s sake, that it turns out to be an April Fools’ Day hoax.


TEST your system’s safety for free by attempting to go to f-secure.com. If you can’t, you can download the patch at microsoft.com to disinfect your PC.

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The internet is filled with threats real and imagined, from malicious hackers to government censors.

Beyond the hacks and cracks — and in celebration of Sunshine Week — we've compiled a brief list of some of the biggest public and private threats facing the internet.

1. Warrantless Government Monitoring : Following the Sept. 11 terror attacks, the practice of wiretapping all internet traffic began in the United States with the Bush administration, and is now being defended in court by the Obama administration. All of the nation's major internet service providers are accused of funneling Americans' online traffic to the National Security Agency without warrants.

2. Private Censorship : From the mundane to the frightening, the examples run rampant. Wikipedia, the world's most trafficked online reference tool, is subject to shameful spin from trusted names of news organizations to the not so trustworthy engines of commerce. Among the examples, The Boston Globe enhanced the biography of a columnist while deleting information about his alleged plagiarism. Diebold excised an entire section critical of the company's voting machines.

3. Government Censorship : Reporters Without Borders reported last week that 12 nations — China, Burma, North Korea, Vietnam, Egypt, Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Cuba and Tunisia restrict internet access and often prosecute users for what they post online.

Even in democratic countries, censorship rears its ugly head. On Thursday, a secret blacklist surfaced detailing 2,395 webpages the Australian government is planning to filter from the internet. While about half of them dealt with illegal pornography, the remainder did not. Some of the sites were about gambling, dentists and even dog kennels.

In December, Wikipedia couldn't be edited by users in Britain. The entire site was put on a blacklist because it linked to the 1976 album cover of Virgin Killer by the Scorpions, which featured a nude young girl.

In the United States, a federal judge last year blocked WikiLeaks from operating in the country for a week after the renegade site posted allegedly stolen documents detailing individuals' Swiss bank accounts.

4. Deep Packet Inspection : Several U.S. internet service providers, including giants like Comcast and Cox Communications, have started inspecting the contents of internet packets, a practice (.pdf) allowing them to monitor, filter and ultimately control the traffic that passes through their pipes. In addition, online advertising services like NebuAd are paying ISPs to let it eavesdrop on web users via DPI.

5. ISP Tiered Pricing : Major ISPs, including AT&T, Time Warner and Comcast have moved or are gravitating toward pricing services based on the amount of bandwidth individuals use. Theoretically, the plans could unlock the internet door to low-income users. But we suspect the plans are designed to increase profits for ISPs as bandwidth use skyrockets — all of which may have a chilling effect on internet usage.
6. Recording Industry Association of America Proposes "Three-Strikes" Policy : The record labels are pushing for ISPs to ban service to customers the RIAA claims are file-sharing copyrighted music. Overseas, industry groups like the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry are pursuing similar efforts.

7. Digital Millennium Copyright Act Abuses : Unwarranted YouTube takedown notices by misguided copyright holders comes immediately to mind — including assertions by Universal Music that it need not consider whether a video, under the DMCA, makes a "fair use" of the copyrighted works in question. Google says 57 percent of takedown notices it received were sent by business targeting competitors and 37 percent were not valid copyright claims.

Note : Tell us what you think are the most threatening threats to the internet...

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