Vietnam, along with the US, India andGermany, have the greatest number of Internet users affected by phishingattacks, with the total number doubling since last year, computersecurity company Kaspersky Lab says.
A study conducted by thecompany found that the number of Internet users worldwide who facedphishing attacks over the last 12 months increased from 19.9 million to37.3 million, a rise of 87 percent.
Facebook, Yahoo, Google and Amazon are among main targets of cyber criminals, it said.
The study, which was based on data from the Kaspersky SecurityNetwork cloud service, found that what was once a subset of spam hasevolved into a rapidly growing cyber threat in its own right.
Phishing is a form of internet fraud in which criminals create a fakecopy of a popular site (an email service, an Internet banking website, asocial networking site ect.) and try to lure the users to these rogueweb pages.
The unsuspecting user enters their logininformation and passwords into these carefully forged websites as theynormally would, but these access credentials are instead sent to thecyber criminals.
The scammers can then use this stolen personalinformation, bank credentials, or passwords to steal the users’ money,to distribute spam and malware via the compromised email or socialnetworking accounts, or they can simply sell their databases of stolenpasswords to other criminals.
For a long time, phishing was regarded as a variation of typical spam email.
However, the date from this survey shows that email is no longerthe most common delivery mechanism for phishing communications. Nearly88 percent of attacks came from links to phishing pages which peoplefollowed while using a web browser, Skype, or otherwise interacting withthe computer.
Kaspersky Lab specialists also compared dataon phishing attacks from over 50 million Kaspersky Security Networkusers between May 1, 2012 and April 30, 2013 with figures for thecorresponding period in 2011-12.
“The volume and variety ofphishing attacks detected during the survey indicates that phishing isnot merely one tool among many for the illegal enrichment of fraudsters,but represents a significant and visible threat.
“Theseattacks are relatively simple to organise and are demonstrablyeffective, attracting an increasing number of cyber criminals to thistype of illegal activity,” said Nikita Shvetsov, Deputy CTO (Research)at Kaspersky Lab.
Therefore, consumers must understandphishing tactics so as to protect themselves against attacks, KasperskyLab specialists say.-VNA
A study conducted by thecompany found that the number of Internet users worldwide who facedphishing attacks over the last 12 months increased from 19.9 million to37.3 million, a rise of 87 percent.
Facebook, Yahoo, Google and Amazon are among main targets of cyber criminals, it said.
The study, which was based on data from the Kaspersky SecurityNetwork cloud service, found that what was once a subset of spam hasevolved into a rapidly growing cyber threat in its own right.
Phishing is a form of internet fraud in which criminals create a fakecopy of a popular site (an email service, an Internet banking website, asocial networking site ect.) and try to lure the users to these rogueweb pages.
The unsuspecting user enters their logininformation and passwords into these carefully forged websites as theynormally would, but these access credentials are instead sent to thecyber criminals.
The scammers can then use this stolen personalinformation, bank credentials, or passwords to steal the users’ money,to distribute spam and malware via the compromised email or socialnetworking accounts, or they can simply sell their databases of stolenpasswords to other criminals.
For a long time, phishing was regarded as a variation of typical spam email.
However, the date from this survey shows that email is no longerthe most common delivery mechanism for phishing communications. Nearly88 percent of attacks came from links to phishing pages which peoplefollowed while using a web browser, Skype, or otherwise interacting withthe computer.
Kaspersky Lab specialists also compared dataon phishing attacks from over 50 million Kaspersky Security Networkusers between May 1, 2012 and April 30, 2013 with figures for thecorresponding period in 2011-12.
“The volume and variety ofphishing attacks detected during the survey indicates that phishing isnot merely one tool among many for the illegal enrichment of fraudsters,but represents a significant and visible threat.
“Theseattacks are relatively simple to organise and are demonstrablyeffective, attracting an increasing number of cyber criminals to thistype of illegal activity,” said Nikita Shvetsov, Deputy CTO (Research)at Kaspersky Lab.
Therefore, consumers must understandphishing tactics so as to protect themselves against attacks, KasperskyLab specialists say.-VNA
