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Internet Surfers, Beware: Malware Hiding On Sites You Misspell Is On The Rise

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Image: NATHAN ALLIARD/PHOTONONSTOP/CORBIS

Netflix.om is not the same as Netflix.com.

While it’s common for hackers to lure unsuspecting web users to sites with URLs that include commonly typed typos, more typosquatters are using Oman’s “.om” country suffix because an “.om” looks a lot like a “.com.”

In fact, there’s been a huge increase in registrations from Oman in the last month for this very reason.

Information security company Endgame published its research into malicious typosquatting, which is when people register web addresses like google.om or googgle.com and redirect those addresses to sites riddled with advertising, malware and adware.

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Endgame’s list of the top “.om” registrants and their web addresses. (Image: Endgame)

Endgame compiled a list of 319 malicious web addresses that specifically use the .om domain. However, since releasing the list, many malicious web addresses anchored around very popular websites, such as amazon.om, netflix.om and yelp.om, no longer point to an actual website. Some entries including yatra.om, baidu.om and adp.om point to advertising, but there is no saying that some of the other web addresses don’t host malicious content that can infect your computer. Endgame notes many malicious sites are now toned down to just host advertising.