Once done over the telephone, is now widespread like wildfire all over the internet. What is it, you ask? Phishing

Phishing is criminally fraudulent robbery of personal information through the basis of cracking or asking for passwords. Its tactics are a subcategory of those related to identity theft. Instead of personal one-on-one telephone calls, every single employee of the gross companies have access to the Internet where they can control up to millions of people with the simple click of a mouse. I remember, and maybe you do too, back when AOL had a serious crisis where users were being asked to give out their password. Information was stolen and money was gained for the gross companies.

Myspace.com is by far one of the most common targeted phishing networks in the phishing world today. Users click links in other Myspace profiles that lead them to a look-a-like Myspace logon page, but were not on Myspace–instead it was a scam page where if users entered their information, their password was now in the hands of the evildoers. Myspace users recognized differences and noticed that they were not the ones making changes to their own account and posting advertisements via messaging and commenting other friend’s profiles. A world of confusion was created for Myspace users. This tactic is an example of Social Engineering, a way to manipulating or tricking users to “sell” or “hand-over” their personal information.

Not to say that it is over yet, as Facebook and Twitter are starting to see this action take place. The ICCC is well aware of this and will take action if necessary.

Identity theft is a crime. It is also an Internet crime. Complaints are filed at the Internet Crime Complaint Center http://www.ic3.gov/default.aspx

Do not let pop ups and other distractions, like emails bother you. ISPs, banks, etc never ask for passwords to be entered by email.

Are you sure of your safety? SonicWALL has posted a quiz: http://www.sonicwall.com/phishing/ to see if you are properly protecting yourself from Phishing threats and what you can do to further your knowledge.