December 11,2008
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Gone Phishing, Pt.2 –
- You whistle while they lurk.Often times, these unscrupulous scammers will lure good people to their sites with links from e-mail or other superfluous little web pages that just seem to pop up out of no where. By clicking on one of these ‘trigger links' which can be as innocent as just trying to close the page or requesting it not to display ever again, the victim is drawn into their ‘web'. These genius ‘spider-brains' then begin to plant spybots to snoop around inside your computer to look for credit card information. So, it's good idea to not allow your computer to ‘memorize' passwords of credit card account information unless you are very savvy with security configurations like those offered by Symantec. Credit card fraud will abound this Christmas Season.
These are not ‘mom & pop' operations. It was estimated by the well-respected Gartner Group last year that illegal ‘phishing' accounted for $3.2 billion in consumer losses. Some 3.6 million honest, hard-working consumers were victimized. Doing the math, you can see that the average loss per consumer was $886. Even this figure is not average, it is constantly climbing. The jump between 2006 and last year was a 64% increase (up from 2.3 million victims). This year is almost certain to be higher. The credit card fraud industry has become humongous. Right now they are selling stolen credit cards online with an inventory of about $276 million worth. If all of those stolen credit cards were to be successfully maxed out, the yield for the criminals would be around $5.3 billion. (For more complete info on this, please refer to articles: "Made in the Shade Shady business", "CC Black Market Thrives.", "CC Black Market Product Line.")
Guard your credit card well. The wiles of these sleazers get more sophisticated every day. Beware of geeks (spelling is correct) bearing gifts. Innocent musical greeting cards and ‘must-see' sites invitations will flood you this season. Be suspicious, especially if they say they were sent by you (some scammers are so stupid, they accidentally use your e-mail name as the originator. Usually they'll pick their best guess from your address list). While you're being entertained, you're also being violated.