National Cyber Security

PRAGUE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–

A new phishing survey released by the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG)
at their conference this week reveals that in the second half of 2011,
China’s Taobao.com became the world’s most frequently phished brand
target, exceeding the previously most-victimized brand, PayPal.

Taobao.com is one of China’s largest e-commerce sites, specializing in
business-to-consumer and consumer-to-consumer transactions, similar to
eBay and Amazon. For several years, PayPal had been the world’s most
frequent phishing target, due to PayPal’s ubiquity and its popularity
with consumers. In 2H2011, there were 18,508 phishing attacks against
Taobao.com – 22 percent of all the phishing attacks recorded worldwide.
There was also drop in attacks against PayPal.

“Attacks by Chinese phishers have exploded, as they take advantage of
China’s stream of new Internet users,” said Greg Aaron of Afilias, one
of the report’s co-authors. “But the problem is not limited to
China—these phishers use hosting and domain names based in the U.S. and
Europe. It’s a reminder that e-crime often requires international
solutions. Fortunately there is data-sharing and cooperation happening
to combat the problem.”

Globally, for the first time, malicious use of subdomain registration
services eclipsed the registration of regular domain names by phishers.
There were 17,390 phishing attacks hosted on subdomain services in the
second half of 2011, using 16,664 unique subdomains. This was a 38
percent increase from the 12,574 attacks we recorded in 1H2011.

“This is a clear example of phishers gravitating towards services they
can readily abuse,” said Rod Rasmussen, CTO of Internet Identity and the
study’s other co-author. “Use of subdomain services is a challenge
because only the subdomain providers themselves can effectively mitigate
these phish. While many of these services are responsive to complaints,
few take proactive measures to keep criminals from abusing their
services in the first place.”

Other highlights of the report include:

1. In 2H2011, the average uptimes of all phishing attacks dropped notably.
2. The number of targeted institutions dropped, as phishers concentrated
   on larger or more popular targets.
3. Malicious domain name registrations are concentrated by domain
   registrar, and by TLD.

The report is available at: http://apwg.org/reports/APWG_GlobalPhishingSurvey_2H2011.pdf

About the APWG

The APWG, founded in 2003 as the Anti-Phishing Working Group, is a
global industry, law enforcement, and government coalition focused on
unifying the global response to electronic crime. Membership is open to
qualified financial institutions, online retailers, ISPs, the law
enforcement community, solutions providers, multi-lateral treaty
organizations, research centers, trade associations and government
agencies. There are more than 2,000 companies, government agencies and
NGOs participating in the APWG worldwide. The APWG‘s Web www.apwg.org
site offers the public and industry information about phishing and email
fraud, including identification and promotion of pragmatic technical
solutions that provide immediate protection. The APWG is co-founder and
co-manager of the Stop. Think. Connect. Messaging Convention, the global
online safety public awareness collaborative www.stopthinkconnect.org
and sponsor of the eCrime Researchers Summit, the world’s only
peer-reviewed research conference dedicated specifically to electronic
crime studies www.ecrimeresearch.org.

Among APWG‘s corporate sponsors are as follows: Afilias Ltd., AhnLab,
ATT(T), Avast!, AVG Technologies, BBN Technologies, BillMeLater, Bkav,
Booz Allen Hamilton, Blue Coat, BrandMail, BrandProtect, Bsecure
Technologies, Check Point Software Technologies , Comcast, CSIRTBANELCO,
Cyber Defender, Cyveillance, Easy Solutions, eBay/PayPal (EBAY), eCert,
EC Cert, ESET, EST Soft, Facebook, Fortinet, FraudWatch International,
F-Secure, GlobalSign, GoDaddy, Google, GroupIB, Hauri,
HitachiJoHo, Huawei Symantec, Iconix, IID, IronPort, ING Bank , Intuit,
IT Matrix, Kindsight, LaCaixa, Lenos Software, MailShell, MarkMonitor,
M86Security, McAfee (MFE), Melbourne IT, MessageLevel, Microsoft (MSFT),
MicroWorld, Mirapoint, MyPW, Netcraft, Network Solutions, NeuStar,
Nominet, Nominum, Panda Software, Phishlabs, Phishme.com, Phorm,
Planty.net, Prevx, Proofpoint, Return Path , RSA Security (EMC),
RuleSpace ,SAIC (From Science to Solutions), SalesForce, SecureBrain,
S21sec, SIDN, SoftForum, SoftLayer, SoftSecurity, SunTrust, SurfControl,
Symantec (SYMC), Tagged, TDS Telecom, Telefonica (TEF), TransCreditBank,
Trend Micro (TMIC), Vasco (VDSI), VeriSign (VRSN), Websense Inc. (WBSN),
Wombat, Yahoo! (YHOO), zvelo and ZYNGA.

Taobao.com is one of China’s largest e-commerce sites, specializing in
business-to-consumer and consumer-to-consumer transactions, similar to
eBay and Amazon. For several years, PayPal had been the world’s most
frequent phishing target, due to PayPal’s ubiquity and its popularity
with consumers. In 2H2011 there were 18,508 phishing attacks against
Taobao.com – 22 percent of all the phishing attacks recorded worldwide.
There was also drop in attacks against PayPal.

During her third week as a music industry business freshman at Loyola, Patricia Calzadilla opened an email that she thought was legitimate.

She went to the website indicated in the email and filled out her name, address and phone number.

Soon after, she started getting text messages from the phisher. The texts directed her to deposit a check to a specified address, and in return, she would receive $2,700. Calzadilla had fallen into a phishing scam.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, “Phishing is the criminally fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information, such as user names, passwords, social security numbers, bank account or credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication.”

Phishers send emails that resemble the website they are trying to imitate. The emails ask the recipient to validate or confirm sensitive information.

Joseph Locascio, director of Computer and Network Services, said Loyola Information Technology tries to stop scammers by putting up a Firewall and a spam checker. The IT department notifies Loyola webmail account holders when a spam scam slips through.

Though these tools are constantly updated on phishing scams, Locascio said, the most recent phishing scam directed email recipients to a website built using Google Documents, which was particularly deceptive, because most people trust Google Documents.

This phishing attack happened before Easter break, and at least 20 Loyola webmail users fell into this scam, Locascio said. He said the problem was that those who logged in to the website gave the scammers their email password. To fix this problem, Loyola IT had the users change their webmail passwords.

Phishers can obtain an email address by using it anywhere the email address is listed on the Internet, Locascio said. Students can go to a search engine and enter enter “your email address” and “@the email domain where you received the phishing email” to see where their email address is listed.

To avoid phishing scams, email users should not respond to an email that asks for sensitive information because legitimate organizations do not ask for this information over email.

Locascio said the best way to report a scam or phishing incident is to call the IT help desk at 504-865-2255. All emails that are suspected to be phishing should be reported to spam@uce.gov.

After the Loyola Tulane Credit Union told her the check she deposited from the phisher bounced, Calzadilla asked her supervisor in Student Finance what to do. Calzadilla said that if it weren’t for her supervisor at Student Finance, she would not have made it out of this incident with such minimal damages. After explaining the situation to the bank, she was only charged $25 for the deposit.

Calzadilla thinks Loyola needs to do more to stop phishing scams.

“I think I fell for this mainly because I thought since it came from my school email, it was safe,” she said. “Things like this make you feel unsafe in your own school.”

Aaren Gordon can be reached at afgordon@loyno.edu 

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Police and officials with the Maine State Credit Union are warning customers of a scam in which someone tries to pry personal information from them so they can raid the customer’s account.

In the so-called “phishing” scam, cellphone users from Portland to Waterville reported receiving an automated message Tuesday telling them their credit union-issued debit card had been frozen and they should call back and enter their 16-digit personal identification number to solve the problem.

The credit union’s president tells the Kennebec Journal about a half-dozen of the 25,000 Maine State Credit Union members fell for the scam, but they didn’t lose any money.

Their accounts were immediately closed and they were issued new cards.

Police say the lesson is never give out personal information over the phone.

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Internet phishing scams are ever increasing and twice last week someone was after my credit card number and PIN, sending personalized emails with urgent messages, one to a work account and the other to a home account.

“Scotia Online” (there is no such thing, though it is deliberately similar to Scotiabank) asked for an update to credit card information. “PayPal” warned a card purchase had been rejected and requested immediate confirmation of the card details. I can’t remember when I last used PayPal and I’m not a Scotiabank customer.

Thousands of people likely received the same emails, and odds are pretty good some were Scotiabank and PayPal customers.

The Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre says it received about 1,350 complaints in 2011 related specifically to phishing and identity theft where those registering the complaint lost money. The agency says 95 per cent of incidents go unreported, so the real number of victims may be closer to 27,000.

The CAFC is a joint operation of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Ontario Provincial Police and Competition Bureau that monitors online fraud. OPP Detective Constable John Schultz, who works with the agency, says your best defence is to delete the email, invest in good anti-virus software and never give up personal information.

He points out that banks will never contact you by email and ask for account numbers or passwords.

“If you’re in doubt, call the bank or drop into a branch,” he says.

You can report phishing attempts to the CAFC via info@antifraudcentre.ca.

The Scotia Online site was live for 13 hours after I received the email. Banks scan the web continuously looking for fraudulent use of their trademarks. They are also part of a global network that works with Internet service providers to shut the fake sites down.

Even so, 13 hours was enough time for fake cards to be created and used to buy things.

If something unusual lands in your inbox, here are the red flags:

1. Accounts and passwords: Banks already know your account numbers. Why would they ask you to confirm them?

2. Immediate action: A message that asks you to act now is hoping the sense of urgency will overcome your suspicions. It is often accompanied by some kind of threat that an account will be closed or purchase rejected.

3. Poor use of language: Awkward grammar, misspellings and bad syntax are dead giveaways. The PayPal email had verb tenses wrong.

4. Long web addresses: Companies keep web addresses simple so they’re easy for you to remember. These web and email addresses were long and awkward.

5. Wrong look and feel: The fake Scotia site had links to Scotia products, used the same red logos and reproduced the bank’s look and feel. But it wasn’t quite right. The more carefully you look, the more apparent the flaws.

The phishing losses reported to the CAFC tend to be small. The average loss is $570 and the good news is that credit card companies usually absorb the loss, cancel the card and issue you a new one. But even so, the best outcome is take steps to avoid the problem in the first place.

Moneyville.ca

A new phishing scam has local bank officials concerned for their customers.

Erie residents have been receiving calls saying their debit card can’t be used for store purchases or at an automated teller machine due to fraud. They are given a number to call and provide their card’s number, security code and PIN number to “reactivate” the card.

Nothing is wrong with their card. The only fraud is what could happen if they call and give the information requested, said Lisa Zamierowski, manager of deposit operations for Marquette Savings Bank.

“Once they get that information, they could produce fraudulent cards and use them for purchases,” Zamierowski said.

Several Marquette customers have contacted Zamierowski’s office in the last week to complain about the calls and confirm their card works properly.

None of the customers have called the number the scammers provided, Zamierowski said.

“I called it a few days ago to see what would happen,” she said. “The number was no longer in service.”

Identity theft, including debit-card fraud, rose 13 percent in 2011, according to an annual report from Javelin Strategy and Research. More than 11.6 million Americans were victims of identity fraud in 2011.

The report found people’s social media and mobile-device behaviors put them at greater risk for fraud.

“Consumers must be vigilant and in control of their personal data as they adopt new mobile and social technologies in order to not make it easier for fraudsters to perpetrate crimes,” said James Van Dyke, Javelin president and founder.

The Washington State Department of Financial Institutions offers these tips to reduce your risk of debit-card fraud:

- If you use your debit card online, take extra precautions with your computer. Install and update virus and spyware protection and a “personal firewall” to stop malicious software from spying on your computer use.

- Never write your PIN on or near your card.

- Don’t give out bank-account information over the telephone unless you have initiated contact.

- Don’t share your PIN, security code or other account information with anyone except co-owners of the account.

- Take precautions at the checkout counter, ATM and gas pump. Try not to let anyone see you enter your PIN and watch to see if a dishonest employee runs your card through two scanners instead of one.

Marquette customers have 60 days after their statement arrives to report any fraudulent transactions to the bank, Zamierowski said.

“The best practice is to contact the bank immediately upon discovery so that the card can be blocked and a new one reissued,” Zamierowski said.