PayPal Targeted with Phishing E-mails

Security researchers are warning PayPal consumers that one fresh phishing e-mail is presently circulating online while attempting to fool gullible visitors who make access to the website. Ghacks.net reported this on December 27, 2010.

Addressing PayPal accountholder (e-mail recipient), the bogus electronic message states that PayPal is continuously making efforts towards making sure that security is in place by routinely monitoring its users' accounts. Thereafter, it states that the online payment company lately found various PCs attempting at logging into the recipient's PayPal account, with several failures in entering the right password prior to the logons.

Consequently, the message prompts the recipient to download a given form and complete it so the problem can be fixed before making an access to his account.

But on downloading, an attached html file -Restore_you_account_PayPal.html opens onto a copycat PayPal website, which reportedly, contains one form directing readers for supplying personal details comprising name and address, and credit card and social security numbers. It, however, doesn't request for the user's PayPal login details.

Indicate the security researchers that undoubtedly the e-mail rather than being from PayPal is crafted to spoof the company. That's evident from the absence of the accountholder's name, non-existence of a PayPal official's name, and lack of any contact details. Moreover, the reply id mentioned within the e-mail is given as nobody@ne07.tt.co.kr rather than a PayPal id.

Sadly, cyber-criminals have long been targeting PayPal, security researchers observe. The observation becomes more credible with one recent report from Avira a German anti-virus company that states that PayPal has been phished the maximum number of times among all the brands, with 57.25% of the entire phishing attacks identified during October 2010 being aimed at PayPal.

Hence, security researchers recommend online shoppers that they must remain particularly careful during the current holiday period. For, scammers, during the upcoming couple of months, are likely to exploit the growing buying activity and broadly target the related end-users. Also, since consumers in general will be conducting their shopping largely via their payment cards during this festive season, they may actually overlook spurious transactions on their credit or debit cards.

Related article: Paypal – Web Hosting Services Need To Work Hard To Tackle Phishing

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