CSOonline: How online polls are hacked and what you should do about it

The news in January about Michael Cohen’s indictments covers some interesting ground for IT managers and gives security teams something else to worry about: He allegedly paid a big data firm Redfinch Solutions to rig two online polls in then-candidate Donald Trump’s favor. To those of us who have worked with online polls and surveys, this comes as no surprise.

Researchers at RiskIQ found another survey-based scam that involves a complex series of steps that use cloned YouTube identities to eventually get marks to take surveys to redeem their “free” iPhones. Instead, the respondents get malware installed on their computers or phones. Security managers need to up their game and understand both the financial and reputational risks of rigged polls and the exploits that are delivered through them. Then they can improve their protective tools to keep hackers away from their networks and users. In this story for CSOonline, I talk about some of these issues and explain why businesses should use online polls and how to keep your networks safe from bad ones. 

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