Hillary Website Targeted by Spammer

By Jeralyn, Section Elections 2008
Posted on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 09:10:10 PM EST
Tags: Hillary Clinton (all tags)

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Via Corrente Wire:: Symantec warns of virus in Hillary spam posing as video link.

The Hillary Clinton election campaign is being exploited in a spam message that tries to trick users into downloading a Trojan to their desktops by pretending to offer a link to a video of a Hillary Clinton campaign speech. "It's the first time we've seen spam like this targeting Hillary Clinton," says Doug Bowers, Symantec's senior director of anti-abuse engineering, who says the spam message, still not seen in large volumes, was first spotted today.

The spam, which has the subject line "Hillary Clinton Video!!" offers users a link promising a video of the presidential candidate giving a speech. In reality, clicking on it would cause a Trojan to be downloaded to compromise the victim's machine for the purpose of sending more spam.

Symantec says the only other candidate being abused this way is Ron Paul.

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Hillary Website Targeted by Spammer | 20 comments (20 topical)

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I did just change the headline (5.00 / 1) (#24)
by Jeralyn on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 01:24:37 PM EST

I still don't agree but it's not worth offending people over.

thanks for the warning! eom (none / 0) (#1)
by Compound F on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 09:13:42 PM EST

Not great company. . . (none / 0) (#2)
by LarryInNYC on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 09:17:16 PM EST

to be in.

: Will we learn who perpetrated this? (none / 0) (#4)
by oculus on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 09:38:03 PM EST

: Socialists, (none / 0) (#25)
by Wile ECoyote on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 02:41:45 PM EST

communists, Obama's Houston office mgr., people who back universal health care, entitlement receivers, and many more.

Heck, this is worse than spam! (none / 0) (#8)
by SandyK on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 10:00:35 PM EST

http://obamamessiah.blogspot.com/

OMG! Obama is even the Messiah now!!!!!!!!!!

Pretty soon we'll be needing to call in cult deprogrammers next. I mean that stuff is insane, as insane as McInsane crap about WWIV.

: that's quite a site (none / 0) (#14)
by Jeralyn on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 11:17:38 PM EST

I hadn't seen it. What's curious to me is the site that is hosting the graphics. What's that about?

: Wow (none / 0) (#15)
by reynwrap582 on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 01:59:08 AM EST

It could be the raw cookie dough I just ate, but when I saw that site I almost booted.

bad headline (none / 0) (#9)
by dc2008 on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 10:12:55 PM EST

How do you know that the spam trick was carried out by Hillary opponents? Usually things like this are done by spammers whose objective is simply to continue sending spam and be able to make money doing so. It's a completely apolitical line of work, as far as I can tell from appearances.

: oh for godsakes (5.00 / 1) (#10)
by Kathy on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 10:14:14 PM EST

she didn't say that Obama did it, she just said someone who is an opponent of Hillary's did it. You do not send out a virus in someone's name if you love them.
It is not all Obama all the time.

: Valid point. (none / 0) (#12)
by sarcastic unnamed one on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 10:24:21 PM EST

Hillary's opponents, as commonly understood and who the headline suggests, are Obama, Gravel, McCain, etc. I'm pretty sure none of them have been indicated as having anything to do with the spam.

Why's the spammer "Hillary Opponents" (none / 0) (#11)
by Ben Masel on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 10:15:12 PM EST

as opposed to garden variety spammers simply taking advantage of the non-trivial likelyhood the link would get clicked?

The headline is unsupported by the evidence (none / 0) (#13)
by RiderOnTheStorm on Thu Feb 14, 2008 at 11:16:10 PM EST

There is, at present, no evidence providing any clue as to who did it -- Hillary opponent, Hillary supporter, someone who cares, someone who doesn't care, in the US, outside the US, whatever. As we've often seen over the past few decades of the spam problem, misdirection is often used to shift blame and distract investigators.

For example: this could be an attempt at human engineering by a non-US spammer who knows Senator Clinton's name -- but not McCain's or Obama's or Huckabee's -- thus the targeting has nothing to do with the campaign, it's just convenient. Or it could be the first of many -- perhaps we'll see subsequent runs highlighting the other candidates. Or maybe it's something else entirely...the point being that until the perpetrator is found (unlikely) and convinced to explain it (more unlikely) we won't know.

My speculation (and let me toss in here that I've been working in this area since well before the slang term "spam" was coined, so while it's speculation...it's very experienced speculation) is that the goal of this has nothing to do with politics -- it's just another attempt to hijack end user systems, and the Clinton campaign was a target of opportunity.
We've seen this before -- many times -- often in response to current events such as Katrina, 9/11, the VA Tech shootings, etc. The spammers involved don't care about the topic, they only care about identifying things that interest recipients enough to get them to play along. (Usually, anything involving naked attractive females works well on half the population, but clearly it doesn't fool everyone -- hence the use of other tactics.)

The best course of action is likely "wait and watch". Once sufficient evidence accrues -- if it accrues -- then maybe we'll have some idea who and why. But be prepared to wait a long time, and possibly still be disappointed.

I very rarely post here, but... (none / 0) (#16)
by bruins01 on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 03:16:41 AM EST

I am going to post to state that saying this is the work of "Hillary opponents" is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard.

This is incredibly specious, even by Talkleft's new, extremely low primary season standards.

Like with many crimes... (none / 0) (#17)
by SandyK on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 03:25:49 AM EST

the perp has to have a M.O..

Not likely a Clinton supporter would do such things. But those who want revenge -- and considering the age of Obama's fans -- the odds are much, much, MUCH higher an Obama supporter did it.

Your grandma isn't going to be doing such stuff, but little Johnny Obama Messiah, would.


: why not the clinton campaign? (none / 0) (#21)
by jdj on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 10:29:42 AM EST

something like this spam, could be a great MSM story for the Clinton's, making her the victim of crazy opponents.
Since we are purely speculating here about her opponents doing it, I would assume it is also fair game to suggest that Penn came up with this as a storychanger point.

there's a legit link to video (none / 0) (#19)
by terriebari on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 09:45:43 AM EST

That really stinks if it's true

I did receive an email with a youtube video, and it is not a virus. It is here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cySK6q2P_Nw

It was sent to me by hillaryclinton.com and I have already viewed it with no issues.

The titleof this post should be changed (none / 0) (#20)
by jdj on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 10:22:00 AM EST

There is no evidence than anyone other than a generic spammer did this. It is really a lie until shown otherwise. A low point for the site as well.

Sometimes these types of (none / 0) (#22)
by PlayInPeoria on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 11:55:34 AM EST

attacks are "hate motivated". Most likely an obsessive, over zealous person. May not be the other camp... but definately a misguided act from an individual seeking to damage Sen Clinton's champaign.

Never said it was "the other camp" (none / 0) (#23)
by Jeralyn on Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 01:22:46 PM EST

or her campaign opponent. Opponent includes unhinged fans.

Since the news article said she was targeted, I think saying it was done by someone who opposes her candidacy is a fair read. I said nothing about it being linked to another political campaign.