Mumbai, Sept 24, 2013 (PTI): Actress Priyanka Chopra has topped the list of the most dangerous celebrities in the Indian cyberspace this year followed by Bollywood superstars Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan, according to a study.
Priyanka knocked off Sunny Leone, who topped the list last year but dropped to the ninth position this time, in the study by security software maker McAfee.
Kareena Kapoor and Akshay Kumar were in the top five in the study which highlights how cybercriminals use celebrities to take advantage of fans seeking more information about their idols.
"In India where celebrities enjoy demigod status, cybercriminals often use their names to lure people to sites which host malicious software designed to compromise personal details and disrupt devices," McAfee India Centre VP Engineering (Consumer and Mobile Business Group) Venkatasubrahmanyam Krishnapur said.
This year, searching for a celebrity’s name, with search terms like "wall paper", "videos" and "nude pictures" resulted in the highest instances of malware-laden sites.
Chopra, showed 79 infected search results, while Shah Rukh was at the second spot with 75 malicious sites, Salman ranked third, with 68 infected sites.
The top-10 list was rounded off by Saif Ali Khan, megastar Amitabh Bachchan, Farhan Akhtar, Leone and Hrithik Roshan.