Link manipulation
Most methods of phishing use some form of technical deception designed to make a link in an e-mail (and the spoofed website it leads to) appear to belong to the spoofed organization. Misspelled URLs or the use of subdomains are common tricks used by phishers. In the following example URL, http://www.yourbank.example.com/, it appears as though the URL will take you to the example section of the yourbank website; actually this URL points to the "yourbank" (i.e. phishing) section of the example website. Another common trick is to make the anchor text for a link appear to be valid, when the link actually goes to the phishers' site. The following example link, Genuine, appears to take you to an article entitled "Genuine"; clicking on it will in fact take you to the article entitled "Deception".
An old method of spoofing used links containing the '@' symbol, originally intended as a way to include a username and password (contrary to the standard).[23] For example, the link http://www.google.com@members.tripod.com/ might deceive a casual observer into believing that it will open a page on www.google.com, whereas it actually directs the browser to a page on members.tripod.com, using a username of www.google.com: the page opens normally, regardless of the username supplied. Such URLs were disabled in Internet Explorer,while Mozilla Firefox and Opera present a warning message and give the option of continuing to the site or cancelling.
A further problem with URLs has been found in the handling of Internationalized domain names (IDN) in web browsers, that might allow visually identical web addresses to lead to different, possibly malicious, websites. Despite the publicity surrounding the flaw, known as IDN spoofing or a homograph attack,no known phishing attacks have yet taken advantage of it.[citation needed] Phishers have taken advantage of a similar risk, using open URL redirectors on the websites of trusted organizations to disguise malicious URLs with a trusted domain.
Source - wikipedia
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Monday, August 4, 2008
Phishing
In computing, phishing is the criminally fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details, by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication. Communications purporting to be from PayPal, eBay, Youtube or online banks are commonly used to lure the unsuspecting. Phishing is typically carried out by e-mail or instant messaging,[1] and it often directs users to enter details at a website. Phishing is an example of social engineering techniques used to fool users.[2] Attempts to deal with the growing number of reported phishing incidents include legislation, user training, public awareness, and technical security measures.
A phishing technique was described in detail in 1987, and the first recorded use of the term "phishing" was made in 1996. The term is a variant of fishing,[3] probably influenced by phreaking,[4][5] and alludes to baits used to "catch" financial information and passwords.
Recent phishing attempts
Phishers are targeting the customers of banks and online payment services. E-mails, supposedly from the Internal Revenue Service, have been used to glean sensitive data from U.S. taxpayers.[15] While the first such examples were sent indiscriminately in the expectation that some would be received by customers of a given bank or service, recent research has shown that phishers may in principle be able to determine which banks potential victims use, and target bogus e-mails accordingly.[16] Targeted versions of phishing have been termed spear phishing.[17] Several recent phishing attacks have been directed specifically at senior executives and other high profile targets within businesses, and the term whaling has been coined for these kinds of attacks.[18]
Social networking sites are a target of phishing, since the personal details in such sites can be used in identity theft;[19] in late 2006 a computer worm took over pages on MySpace and altered links to direct surfers to websites designed to steal login details.[20] Experiments show a success rate of over 70% for phishing attacks on social networks.[21]
Almost half of phishing thefts in 2006 were committed by groups operating through the Russian Business Network based in St. Petersburg.
...to be continued
A phishing technique was described in detail in 1987, and the first recorded use of the term "phishing" was made in 1996. The term is a variant of fishing,[3] probably influenced by phreaking,[4][5] and alludes to baits used to "catch" financial information and passwords.
Recent phishing attempts
Phishers are targeting the customers of banks and online payment services. E-mails, supposedly from the Internal Revenue Service, have been used to glean sensitive data from U.S. taxpayers.[15] While the first such examples were sent indiscriminately in the expectation that some would be received by customers of a given bank or service, recent research has shown that phishers may in principle be able to determine which banks potential victims use, and target bogus e-mails accordingly.[16] Targeted versions of phishing have been termed spear phishing.[17] Several recent phishing attacks have been directed specifically at senior executives and other high profile targets within businesses, and the term whaling has been coined for these kinds of attacks.[18]
Social networking sites are a target of phishing, since the personal details in such sites can be used in identity theft;[19] in late 2006 a computer worm took over pages on MySpace and altered links to direct surfers to websites designed to steal login details.[20] Experiments show a success rate of over 70% for phishing attacks on social networks.[21]
Almost half of phishing thefts in 2006 were committed by groups operating through the Russian Business Network based in St. Petersburg.
...to be continued
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
