There seems to be a playbook of standard hacker tactics after a celebrity death or an event of worldwide interest like earthquakes or tsunamis.  Hours after the announcement of pop diva Whitney Houston’s death, scammers had already devised schemes to prey on fans seeking information – appearing to recycle those used after the deaths of Michael Jackson and Steve Jobs.

A Facebook message, claiming to link to a video of Whitney Houston’s autopsy, takes the user to a page with an embedded YouTube video. When you try to play it, a pop-up message appears instructing the user to update their copy of Adobe’s Flash from a bogus site. The video scam has become viral. Read more…