McAfee declares Lily Collins the world's most dangerous celebrity

The daughter of musician Phil Collins already gets enough negative publicity for having the former Genesis frontman as a dad, but now she also has the dubious honor of topping the anti-virus firm's annual list of risky web searches.

Every year, McAfee compiles a list of the top 10 celebrity names which, when typed into a search engine, are most likely to result in a concealed malware attack, whether it's spam, spyware or a virus.

According to the 2013 chart, typing Lily Collins into Google or Bing or Yahoo as part of a search term poses a 14.5 percent chance of getting an infected PC, whereas a search for Avril Lavigne, 2013's second most dangerous celebrity, poses a 12.7 percent risk. The top three are rounded out by Sandra Bullock (who poses a 10.8 percent risk).

As well as highlighting how easy it is to catch the average web surfer unawares, the annual charts are also an excellent barometer of popular culture and show how well most hackers and cyber miscreants are plugged into the zeitgeist. None of the celebrities that made the 2012 list -- which was topped by British actress Emma Watson and also contained Jessica Biel, Eva Mendes, Selena Gomez and Megan Fox -- feature in this year's top 10.

As Paula Greve, director of web security research at McAfee, explains: "Today's consumers often are completely unaware of security risks when searching for celebrity and entertainment news, images and videos online, sacrificing safety for immediacy. Cybercriminals prey on consumers' addiction to breaking news and leverage this behavior to lead them to unsafe sites that can severely infect their computers and devices and steal personal data."

This year's list is also notable because it actually sees the return of a male celebrity, in the form of "Mad Man" actor Jon Hamm in at number 8, though if the list is expanded beyond the top 10, Justin Timberlake (12) and Patrick Dempsey (13) make the top 20. The last time a man appeared in the charts was in 2011 when British journalist and broadcaster Piers Morgan found himself in the number three slot, just behind Cameron Diaz in second and Heidi Klum in first place.

The list in full:

1. Lily Collins 14.5% risk
2. Avril Lavigne 12.7% risk
3. Sandra Bullock 10.8% risk
4. Kathy Griffin 10.6% risk
5. Zoe Saldana 10.5% risk
6. Katy Perry 10.4% risk
7. Britney Spears 10.1% risk
8. Jon Hamm 10.0% risk
9. Adriana Lima 9.9% risk
10. Emma Roberts 9.8% risk

The report doesn't mean that an innocent search for news on a favorite movie star or fashion icon will result in a malware attack, but augmenting said search with terms such as ‘free download' or ‘pictures' can pose a serious risk.

Thankfully, as well as the list, McAfee, as befits a company focused on computer protection, has also provided some top tips for safer searching:

Don't download: Beware of any site that prompts you to download something before providing content, particularly videos -- stick to streaming, YouTube or a celebrity's official site. Never download anything from a website you don't trust -- especially video. Most news clips you'd want to see can easily be found on official video sites, and don't require you to download anything. Therefore, if a website offers an exclusive video for you to download, don't.
Nothing for free: "Free downloads" are significantly the highest virus-prone search term. Anyone searching for videos or files to download should be careful as not to unleash malware on their computer. Established news sites may not entice you with exclusives for one solid reason: there usually aren't any. Try to stick to official news sites that you trust for breaking news.

Nothing personal: If you receive a message, text or email or visit a third-party website that asks for your information -- credit card, email, home address, Facebook login, or other information -- for access to an exclusive story, don't give it out. Such requests are a common tactic for phishing that could lead to identity theft.

Lock all doors and windows: Make sure every computer or connected device in your home has up-to-date virus protection and that each is running the latest version of all apps, web browsers and other software programs. A suspect search on one PC can run the risk of infecting all other computers on the network.