Feiss Alerts Students Against 'Phishing' E-mails

According to the news published by The Flat Hat on June 25, 2008, an electronic message was sent to students by Geoff Feiss, Provost of College of William and Mary, advising them to watch out for a "phishing" attack.

The main aim of phishers in such attacks is to get the private information of unwary students. Nevertheless, to prevent students from falling prey to phishing attacks, Feiss informed in his e-mail that over 15 students on the campus had responded to these phishing emails and became easy targets of phishing attacks.

Feiss said that lately, several campus residents got e-mails requesting them to send their user IDs and passwords. These phishing messages seemed to originate from the College's Information Technology department, as reported by The Flat Hat on June 25, 2008. But, the IT department of the College never request its students to forward their passwords through e-mail.

Feiss also revealed that the content of a couple of "phishing" messages meant to dupe students into divulging their private information.

One of these phishing messages stated, it wanted to notify all {wm.edu} Webmail users that they would be updating their Website shortly. Moreover, all users were expected to mail their e-mail account particulars in order to ascertain that the users' mailboxes were still active. All non-operational mail accounts would be removed to create more space for prospective users. Thus, users should forward their email account particulars such as user ID: and password.

News reports indicated that the other text was aimed at Webmail Account Owners, and stated that these emails were from WM.EDU messaging center for WM.EDU account holders.

The phishing message reiterated that on May 2nd, 2008, between 3:15 PM to 6:00 AM, regular maintenance of all Mailhub systems would be completed. So users wouldn't be able to access their emails via Webmail for a while during this period. The email also asked users to visit the Webpage as their email account centers and database were being upgraded. Also, they were removing all email accounts of WM.EDU to make more space for fresh accounts. This message then asks for password and user ID.

Related article: Fake Spam Mail Announces Australian PM’s Heart Attack

» SPAMfighter News - 7/15/2008