Hackers Use Websites in Recent Scams

Recently, some online criminals appeared to have hacked the official website of Lake County Sheriff of US and made it a medium to host a false "Commonwealth Bank" login page to spread a phishing scam. The first phishing e-mail arrived in the mailbox of a ZDNet Australian tipster luring him to click on a link to a fake website, and key in his "Commonwealth Internet" banking login and password details.

Unfortunately, both Lake County Sheriff Chris Daniels and a Commonwealth Bank representative were unavailable to give their comments.

The online miscreants attack legitimate web servers to surreptitiously host web content and scripts that are used in frauds. Websites of Sarajevo Airport, Samsung and University of New South Wales are involved in current scams.
ZDNet Australia complained of a phishing attack that led victims to a hacked portion of the 'Sarajevo Airport' Website. In the beginning of this month, a website owned by Samsung in US was entertaining Trojan horse software. In August "The School of Media, Film and Theatre" at the 'University of NSW' reported that one of its servers was externally controlled to host a malicious file that pretended to be a Microsoft security patch.

Statistics prove that cyber crime has burst forcefully in current years. This is because the increasing use of the Internet accompanied with enhanced technology has made it possible for online pilferers and fraudsters to strike a greater number of victims.

To prevent being hit by spoof e-mails, users are advised not to respond to such mails that claim to be from some financial institution. The best is to delete them. Moreover, awareness is important such as to understand the various objectives for hacking. Since issues of purpose and heedlessness are at the core of criminal activity, a wider knowledge of these can help to better identify and tackle the offending behaviors.

Related article: Hackers Redirect Windows Live Search to Malicious Sites

» SPAMfighter News - 10/6/2006