How can you get hacked by searching online for info on cats?

If you’ve ever wanted to know whether it is illegal to own a Bengal cat in Australia (because who wouldn’t want to know that) you might want to refrain from looking for the answer on the Internet at the moment. A team of cybersecurity researchers from Sophos have discovered a unique SEO poisoning campaign targeting people searching for these very specific criteria.

SEO poisoning is when cyber criminals manipulate search engine results so that their malicious website appears at the top of search results for a specific query. Then, the unknowing searchers who open those websites are phished for sensitive data or offered malware downloads. It is certainly not a new or unusual technique — what makes this specific instance unique is the targeted search topic.

The scam website only appears in results for “Are Bengal cats illegal in Australia?” Why would they choose such a narrow field of potential targets? We won’t know unless they’re ever caught, but TechRadar speculated they might have been testing their abilities in a niche before attempting a more sweeping campaign.