Phishing E-Mails Target Retirement & Investment Accountholders

According to news released by gantdaily on October 23, 2008, Tom Corbett, Attorney General of Pennsylvania, cautioned online users about phishing e-mail scams posing to be messages in connection with retirement or investment accounts.

Corbett explained that scammers are currently sending e-mails that seemed to have come from retirement schemes, authentic banks, managers of investment accounts, or other types of financial institutions, requesting consumers to update their online account details such as usernames and passwords. Also, the scam e-mails typically contain a link for consumers to click on and provide their personal information including private account number.

Corbett also said that the scammers are extremely good at using current news events to make their schemes appear real and urgent. Accordingly, they are taking advantage of the current instability in financial and investment markets.

Moreover, the ID thieves are good at producing messages that look official with which they try to attract unsuspecting consumers. They also exploit the current events to convince consumers that they need to act fast to avoid any possible problem regarding their accounts.

Meanwhile, security specialists stated that identity thieves commonly use the phishing scams to steal financial account and other personal information from innocent and unsuspecting victims. Information acquired through such scams is often utilized to withdraw funds from the accounts of consumers or to open fresh or counterfeit accounts by impersonating their identity.

Further, according to Envisional, an Internet security firm, as the global economy is going through a financial crisis, cyber criminals are increasingly targeting bank customers.

Thus, commenting on the issue, internet security specialists asked consumers to be cautious of any message soliciting personal and private information like social security numbers or account numbers, despite the messages seem to arrive from a legitimate official source.

Moreover, according to the experts, users must understand that legitimate organizations never request consumers to provide their personal information over e-mail. Meanwhile, Corbett said that anyone thinks that his or her account is compromise should contact the financial institution immediately to find out if the problem exists.

Related article: Phishing With A Redirector Code

» SPAMfighter News - 11/5/2008