When Avril Lavigne announced she was working on a new record, the pop star could have never preempted it would lead to her becoming the most dangerous artist online.
That’s according to cybersecurity firm McAfee, which has released its 11th annual McAfee Most Dangerous Celebrities study.
According to the study, Avril Lavigne is the most likely celebrity to land users on websites that carry viruses or malware.
“[People] surf the internet to find the latest celebrity gossip, discover a new song, and even interact with our favourite stars. And cybercriminals know that. In fact, they’re capitalising on that by weaving in sneaky cyberthreats within celebrity sites,” wrote McAfee.
Following the announcement Lavigne is recording new music – along with the morbid death hoax internet conspiracy that has people believing she died in 2003 and has been replaced by a lookalike – searches for Lavigne have a 14.5% chance of landing on a web page with potential for online threats. And if users search for her full name and the text ‘free MP3s’, that number that increases to 22%.
“[Hackers] love to leverage downloadable content like music or video files to entice consumers to visit potentially malicious websites designed to install malware,” said McAfee.
Taking the crown from Amy Schumer to top the list, Lavigne becomes the first female musician to take the #1 spot. She was ranked #2 in 2013.
Bruno Mars made his debut on the list this year, placing at #2 with a 13.43% chance of landing on a web page with potential for online threat.
Bruno Mars is followed closely behind by Carly Rae Jepsen (#3), Zayn Malik (#4), Celine Dion (#5), Calvin Harris (#6), and Justin Bieber (#7).
The top 10 celebrities with the highest risk percentage are:
PositionCelebrityPercentage1Avril Lavigne14.51%2Bruno Mars13.43%3Carly Rae Jepsen13.19%4Zayn Malik13.06%5Celine Dion12.92%6Calvin Harris12.48%7Justin Bieber12.33%8Diddy12.32%9Katy Perry12.25%10Beyoncé (search was conducted with “Beyonce”)12.09%
This article originally appeared on The Industry Observer, which is now part of The Music Network.
