According to the recent reports the users of Facebook social networking again were hit greatly by the Koobface worm, or being more precise by it new variant. As before, the malware generates messages to friends of infected users on the social networking website. These messages direct the unwary into visiting websites that supposedly offer video clips. Would-be marks are told they need the latest copy of Adobe Flash to view this content and are prompted to download a file, which actually contains the worm's payload. The latest Koobface variant is programmed to hijack search queries and divert infected users to bogus sites, benefiting crooks through related ad hijacking and click fraud in the process.

In view of those facts the president-elect Barack Obama was suggested creating a new White House post to fix the problem. According to the suggestion the cyber chief should report directly to the President and oversee a comprehensive strategy that combines diplomatic, intelligence, and military tools and works closely with the private sector.

The document, titled Securing Cyberspace for the 44th Presidency, also proposes Obama to establish a National Office for Cyberspace (NOC) by merging the existing National Cyber Security Center and the Joint Inter-Agency Cyber Task Force. Along with a newly-created directorate of the National Security Council, it would assume expanded authority for enforcing safety standards to be followed by all government agencies.

"The fact they're talking about the need to create strategy indicates this (previous effort) wasn't sufficient, yet they don't document how or provide recommendations about what should be done differently," said Tom Parker, director of commercial security services for Securicon, a Washington-based provider of IT security services to federal and commercial customers. "It's important when you have failings like that that you take heed of why you failed."