The year's biggest email security scams
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
The launch of phishing scams purporting to originate from hurricane recovery charities is one of the biggest email security stories of the year so far.
Such is the claim of IT Wire, which said that the recent phishing email attack continued a longstanding practise of preying on international events of popular interest to consumers and businesses.
Furthering this, it noted that a phishing scam which lured people in with details of a sex tape made by presidential candidate Barack Obama also showed how hackers are keen on grabbing user details on the back of sensational headlines.
Meanwhile, the email security breach affecting Sarah Palin was said to highlight the ease with which many hackers can bypass weak passwords and take control of accounts.
Lastly, the website claimed that the story of a virus infiltrating the international space station via a laptop highlighted the fact that weak email security on single devices can compromise entire networks.
In other developments, French president Nicolas Sarkozy has recently been caught out by a phishing scam which extracted a number of small sums from his account.
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