Security

Warning! Vishing Attacks in Progress!

New type of attacks target people's bank accounts

By Bogdan Popa, Security and Search Engines Editor

22nd of January 2008, 20:26 GMT

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People's money and their bank accounts represent the most important target for numerous hackers/attackers out there, so most attempts aim to steal these sensitive details. The Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) reported a few days ago that a new type of attack called "vishing" continues to rise and to threaten more and more people. Vishing is somehow similar with

phishing because they both aim to steal financial information, or to convince users to disclose their sensitive details. While phishing is based on malicious websites, the vishing attacks focus on fake telephone numbers pretending to be registered by banks or other organizations.

The victim of a vishing attack receives a message saying that his/her account was suspended or terminated and, in order to keep it active, he has to call a phone number to give more information. Once the user enters the number, he is requested to provide the card number for security matters.

"For authenticity, some fraudulent e-mails claim the bank would never contact customers to obtain the PII by any means, including e-mail, mail, and instant messenger. These e-mails further warn recipients not to provide sensitive information when requested in an e-mail and not to click on embedded links, claiming they could contain 'malicious software aimed at capturing login credentials'", IC3 wrote in an advisory published on its official page.

What's interesting is that some of the email sent to the victims may also contain pieces of malware used to steal or compromise the data stored on your computer. Just like usual, you're advised to ignore these messages and avoid opening them as long as you're not sure if they're legitimate. An updated antivirus is always welcomed, so don't forget to apply the latest virus definitions released by the vendor. In addition, you should contact your bank to clarify the problem.

TAGS:

vishing | attack | security | email

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