Phishers Once Again Target MobileMe User Community

A complex phishing scam has targeted MobileMe, Apple's online service, as it tricks users into giving away their credit card details. Also the scam like all the usual ones is spread to users through e-mails crafted to appear like official correspondences from the MobileMe service unit of Apple.

The scam e-mail tells the recipients that their payment details supplied through their MobileMe account could not be passed through due to the renewal of their annual service subscription charge of $99. Therefore, says the e-mail, the recipient needs to click a given link and enter his credit card details in order to confirm the same. However, the link maliciously connects to a MobileMe website that is actually bogus.

Meanwhile, following the discovery of the phishing scam, Apple assured its MobileMe users that the e-mail was not a bit authentic. So the company warned the users never to follow e-mail links that ask for their credit card details. Also they must never reveal their credit card particulars unless they were fully sure about the genuineness of the deal, the company stressed, as reported by MacWorld on February 11, 2009.

Further, with investigations still going-on, security experts advise users that when they get any e-mail such as in the instance of MobileMe, they must always check the sender's address in their Web browser for the official status of its website. This is because phishers and other online thieves often buy domain names that have the addresses of the real sites with just a difference of a character or two, the experts explained.

Moreover, people should be very careful while accessing their e-mails, as phishers constantly make the rounds with their latest and most advanced social engineering tricks to steal the users' financial and other personal information. They should also deploy up-to-date anti-malware and anti-virus solutions to protect their computers from malicious downloads and other similar activities, the experts added.

Meanwhile, phishers' attack against Apple's MobileMe service is not new. Earlier in September 2008, there had been a similar attack that targeted customers of this particular online facility.

Related article: Phishers Expand Their Sphere of Attacks

» SPAMfighter News - 2/25/2009