Hackers actively exploiting Adobe flaw

Cape Town - Computers that are running an unpatched version ofAdobe Flashareat risk as cyber criminals engage in a sustained attack, a security company says.According to Trend Micro, unpatched versions of the popular software are the target of criminals through compromised ad servers."Users think they are up to date, protected and are going to trusted sites, yet are still affected by malware onthe system," the company said.Most Windows computers use Adobe software which has been subject to a number of vulnerabilities over the last year, but the researchers said that the security hole could allow an attacker to potentially take over your machine."This vulnerability or flaw can be used byattackers to run code or programs on your Windows computer as if you ran it. Anything you can do on your computer the attacker’s program can do. In a worstcase like this, they can load malware on your computer," wrote Christopher Budd on the company's blog.Financial informationOn Tuesday Adobe released a patch to fix flaws inAdobe Flash Player, but it is not clear whether the patch covers the latest discovery.Users who have not patched their machines are still exposed to risk as cyber criminals would likely share detailsof how they compromised systems in the criminal underground.Computers that have been compromised are subject to having malware installed on them, potentially giving criminals a direct hand in stealing user personal or financial information.Malware is also spread as computer users surf the web."What makes this situation more serious is that the attacks we've seen are using banner ads (called 'malvertisements') to spread malware. This means that you cango to trusted sites you expect to be safe and still get malware on your system," said Budd."These attacks work by attackers targeting and compromising the third-party ad servers that offer the ads you see on legitimate and popular sites. Thisis a particularly nasty form of attack, one that puts average users at great risk," he added.