FBI Cautions People of E-mail Scam Circulating in New York

The New York Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is warning the state's inhabitants that cyber-criminals have launched a fresh surge of phishing e-mails.

In this campaign, the scam e-mail dispatched to a few people working at any financial institution directs that recipients should complete a "Confirmation Form" of an updated edition by following a web-link provided within the message.

But, on following it, the user is redirected on a website, which looks very much like the real website of the aforesaid institution but is not really so. Thereafter, the fake site prompts the user to feed personal username, password, e-mail address, own name, card number of his membership, its expiration date, PIN, and security code. And just as the details are fed, they are all seized that enables the scammers to compromise the user's account.

Remarking about this new phishing scam, Mary Galligan Special Agent heading FBI NY Division's Cyber/Special Operations stated that the above kind of crime was sadly extremely common as also that it attacked financial institutions of various kinds. Northcountrygazette.org published this on November 15, 2010. Ms. Galligan added that the warning was a reiteration that everybody should check their Internet activities.

Worryingly, the most recent phishing scam that the FBI New York has detected is the 2nd one, which's apparently wreaking havoc inside New York following the one during October 2010 that the Internal Revenue Service detected. That October phishing scam, as per reports, targeted taxpayers in NY, while posing as communications from the Electronic Federal Tax Payment System.

Eventually, FBI suggests some tips for the general public to follow to remain safe from such scams. First, it mustn't click on web-links embedded on e-mails, in case there's any suspicion that the e-mail got is unauthentic. Second, people mustn't complete online forms sent through e-mails which direct to enter the users' financial and other personal information. Third, they must always forward spoofed or phishing e-mails at spam@uce.gov, reportphishing@antiphishing.org and the like e-mail addresses. And finally, they must inform FBI's IC3 (Internet Crime Complaint Center) via lodging a complaint at www.ic3.gov, the official website of the Center.

Related article: FBI’s ICCC Annual Report Discusses Fraudulent and Non-Fraudulent Complaints

» SPAMfighter News - 11/29/2010