As the 2012 Summer Olympics in London gears up to become , hackers and cybercriminals are expected to pose a huge concern for users on sites such as , and .
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"Social media will be a major vehicle for Olympics-related fraud this year," Angel Grant, senior manager at anti-fraud solutions company RSA, told Mashable. "Thousands of people already follow the games via social channels, and fraudsters worldwide are eager to leverage the interest around the Olympics to launch cyber attacks with the goal of stealing personal information."
To prevent social media accounts from being comprised, security firms are urging users to use caution when clicking on links that are allegedly sent from the site itself.
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"Avoid directly responding to email alerts that appear to come from Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites and even your bank," Grant said. "Instead, go directly to these sites by typing their URLs directly into your browser or using a browser bookmark."
Meanwhile, Olympic-themed phishing emails will be among the most popular tactics used to steal your information, according to RCA. In fact, some of these scams have already started to circulate the web -- Internet users earlier this month were led to believe that they won tickets to the Olympic Games and needed to fill out a form with personal information to claim their prize.
"If it's too good to be true, it probably is," Grant added.
Fake ticketing sites will also be set up, luring unsuspecting web users looking especially for tickets to popular events such as swimming and track and field into a trap.
"The market for scalped tickets is one of the biggest around, and it’s full of fake sites trying to scam you out of not just your money, but your financial information as well," RCA said.
The official London2012.com site has a “Ticket Checker” where fans can check the URL of the site on which they are considering buying tickets to determine if it’s real, as well as a list of known fraudulent ticketing sites.
"Avoid directly responding to email alerts that appear to come from Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites and even your bank," RSA advises. "Instead, go directly to these sites by typing their URLs directly into your browser or using a browser bookmark."
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This story originally published on Mashable .