Criminals have a long history of targeting what people like most, and judging from the new 2011 Threat Predictions Report from McAfee, cybercriminals will continue to be no different.  McAfee predicted that many of the technologies that gained popularity in the past 12 months may be exploited or attacked by online crooks next year.

The security firm said in a statement, "The list comprises 2010’s most buzzed about platforms and services, including Google’s Android, Apple’s iPhone, foursquare, Google TV and the Mac OS X platform, which are all expected to become major targets for cybercriminals."

URL shorteners, botnets, and social engineering practices may represent growing threats, as well.

Vincent Weafer, the senior vice president of McAfee Labs, reasoned, "We’ve seen significant advancements in device and social network adoption, placing a bulls-eye on the platforms and services users are embracing the most.  These platforms and services have become very popular in a short amount of time, and we’re already seeing a significant increase in vulnerabilities, attacks and data loss."

Then one other thing worth mentioning: due to the example set by WikiLeaks, McAfee thinks politically motivated attacks will become more common.  We’ll just leave it to you to decide whether that’s more of a good or bad thing.

Additional information from McAfee is available here if you’re interested.