MANILA, Philippines ? While Filipinos mourn over the death of a national icon in former president Corazon ?Cory? Aquino, high-tech criminals are taking advantage of the situation and created a fake antivirus.

The fake ?Cory? antivirus, TROJ_FAKEALRT.FK, was found just recently by antivirus developers from TrendLabs

The fake antivirus was discovered hidden in several websites, and were aimed mostly for search engine optimization attacks. Users who were looking for news on the former president?s death through search engines would be directed to some of these malicious websites.

TrendLabs said in a statement the fake ?Cory? antivirus was similar to previous attempts at spreading SEO attacks by exploiting recent news events. Among these were the death of American actress Farrah Fawcett, the A(H1N1) pandemic, and the recent total solar eclipse.

Aquino?s death, which culminated in one of the most massive funeral processions in recent Philippine history, was widely covered by both traditional news organizations and by bloggers and users of social networking sites.

Many Filipinos abroad also turned to online news organizations, social networking sites, and forums for updates on the death and burial of Aquino. There are more than 1.7 million Filipinos working abroad.

Such a huge number of potential victims enticed cybercriminals to exploit Aquino?s death by spreading malicious software.