Cyber Criminals Are Exploiting Adobe

San Francisco Business Times reports: Cyber criminals will shift their attention from Microsoft Corp. to Adobe Systems in 2010, according to a prediction from security company McAfee Inc.

Redmond, Washington, behemoth Microsoft will be displaced as the No. 1 target of cyber criminals by San Jose’s Adobe, according to the report “2010 Threat Predictions,” by McAfee in Santa Clara, California.

“Cyber criminals have long picked on Microsoft products due to their popularity. In 2010, we anticipate Adobe software, especially Acrobat Reader and Flash, will take the top spot,” the report says.

As another recent report by Cisco Systems reported, cyber criminals have been eyeing social networks like Facebook and Twitter as they’ve grown in popularity. McAfee’s report says this trend will likely continue in 2010.

McAfee echoes the warning in Cisco’s recent report that criminals use the trust people put in their Facebook “friends” to fool them into downloading malicious programs or giving away passwords and other personal data. “Malware authors love following the social-networking buzz and hot spots of activity; that will continue in 2010,” the report says.

Banking Trojan programs will also continue to become more sophisticated next year—sometimes they’ll interrupt a real banking transaction in process to take money from a user’s account.

New technology like the sophisticated HTML 5 will also offer new ways for hackers and others to exploit people online.