2006 Is The Year Of Most Phishing Attacks

'Symantec' has declared 2006 as the year of Internet fraud. In its recent report, the company said that Internet fraud was growing with greater sophistication, particularly in 'phishing' in 2006.

The security firm estimated over 7 million phishing attempts everyday. And there were more than 900 unique messages per day in the first six months of 2006. This accounted for 80% increase with approximately 500 unique phishing messages per day, over the last six months of 2005. The company detected 157,477 single-numbered phishing messages in the earlier half of 2006, a growth by 81% over the latter half of 2005. The report said that 86% of the security threats targeted home PCs in the first half of 2006.

The report further put forth that 70% of the brands that were swindled in phishing attacks originated in the U.S. Of the top ten-phishing targets, nine were financial institutions.

According to the report, new phishing mechanisms targeting 'VoIP' and 'SMS' are becoming increasingly popular. It suggests that the volume of phishing e-mails tend to drop during weekends and come back on Tuesdays.
2006 was a year of voluminous 'zero-day' exploits as well. There was an increase in attacks on vulnerabilities not previously known. Symantec observed, attackers were capable of developing exploits in a flip of time it takes vendors to mend them. This means users remain unprotected for weeks at a time. The security vendor noted that it takes an average time of three days to develop an exploit in comparison to 28 days for a vendor to design and release a 'security patch'.

This year, said the company, attackers widely adopted 'rootkits'. These programs thrive on machines, which access to low-level functions. They, therefore, enable attackers to bypass detection on a system. rootkits have become a mainstream tool for cyber criminals.

Gary Stoops, vice president, National Cyber-Forensics and Training Alliance, contributed to 'Symantec Phish Report Network'. He suggested that online fraud, most often conducted through phishing attacks, is an escalating problem. It damages consumers' confidence and trust in the Internet.

Related article: “Loopholes did not cause online banking thefts”: ICBC

» SPAMfighter News - 12/11/2006