Financial Phishing Attacks On The Rise
Cyber-criminals have been capitalizing on the global financial crisis in the past several weeks by increasing the volume of phishing and spam messages being sent.
These emails are not much different from older attacks, but because they are topical and look authentic, nervous consumers are at risk for falling for the scam.
Internet users should be on alert for fake emails that look as if they have come from an authentic financial institution. These phishing messages are seeking personal information – account numbers, passwords and Social Security numbers – which cyber-criminals will use to empty out accounts, and then sell on the underground market.
These e-mails (usually) contain links which take you very legit-looking login websites, which in fact are created by the crook. This short video from the good folks at WOT demonstrates how this works.
Tip of the day: Follow these security tips to get protection from phishing attacks:
- Review your financial account statements as soon as you receive them
- Financial institutions never require customers to give account information via email. If you receive an email requesting this data, don’t reply.
- Use anti-virus and anti-spyware software and update them regularly.
- Use a firewall.
- Use WOT as preventative protection against online threats to avoid spyware, browser hijacking, identity theft, phishing and other Internet scams.
- Always be suspicious of e-mail, and never click the link.
Today’s free download: Yes, this is a repeat; but if you haven’t downloaded the WOT browser plug-in, maybe today you’ll go ahead and give it a try. Why not? It’s light-weight, effective, easy to understand, and free!
Copyright 2007-8 © Tech Paul. All rights reserved.
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• About Tech Paul
I am a Retired computer & network technician. I used to think the machines were pretty cool. Now I don’t.
They’re anything but.
I regularly posted how-to’s and tricks & tips and general computing advice here starting in 2007. (Use the Search tool to find answers. But be aware, many are rather dated.) Sometimes I answered (your) specific questions in an article if I believed the answer was generally helpful to “everyone”. All the writing you see was my own, typos and all. There always is/was an implied “IMHO” in what you see here.
Note: You are responsible for using this blog and its content. I am in no way liable for any losses caused by user error, viruses and/or other malware, hardware or software failure, or any other conceivable reason.
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McAfee® Cybersafety Resource Portal, an online help center designed to assist victims of computer crime and provide information on how to avoid becoming a victim.
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[…] Financial Phishing Attacks On The Rise Categories: Online ScamTags: alert, browser, computers, cyber-crime, fraud, internet, kids, microsoft, outlook, phishing, phraud, post-to-jaanix, recent-readers, safety, security, techpaul, video, windows About the Author […]
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Pingback by Financial Phishing Attacks On The Rise | Conning Us | November 5, 2008 |
I put WOT on my mother’s machine and told her to watch out for red. It’s that simple!
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It’s only going to get worst. Phishing has been on the rise as indicated on a few blogs I have published.
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You are absolutely right, Frank.
Far more action needs to be taken — at an International level — to go after and stop “cyber” criminals.
Sadly, they are already so far ahead of the game that some experts say TCP/IP is a “dead” technology and needs to be replaced.
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