Phishing is a crime in which the purpose is to gather confidential individual facts deceptively which is then used for “identity theft”. Phishing has proved to be a major concern for sometime now. The main trend by which Phishing is carried out is that generally a false e-mail is sent to an individual by an unknown identity which claims to be a recognized organization. The main purpose behind this act is to collect correct personal and confidential information that will be misused later for identity theft. Socially acceptable engineering tools are used in conducting this criminal activity.
Techniques used for Phishing
Different techniques with high technical perfection are employed to carry on Phishing activities such as Phone Phishing, Website Forgery and Link Manipulation. Phone Phishing uses phone as a mean of collecting vital personal information such as phone number, bank account number and pin number in tracing the financial balance in a bank of an individual. Website Forgery is another Phishing mean.
Actually the websites which are used for this activity look very genuine and convincing including even the URL, that it really becomes tough to identify that these sites are actually fake. As far as Link manipulation is concerned, a link may be designed to belong to a spoofed enterprise to win over the confidence of the user.
Fighting against Phishing
We need to be more alert and attentive while using Internet and specially while visiting any site. Training should be provided to the Internet Users to make them capable of dealing with Phishing activities. After getting such an e-mail, the user must recheck the authenticity of such a mail from the Company itself. Anti-Phishing Working Group is a recognized body working towards the future elimination of Phishing.
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