Phishing attacks increase sevenfold in five months

Phishing attacks increase sevenfold in five months

Online fraud watchers have reported that there were nearly 1,200 new phishing attacks reported in May - and that the number is rising.

Link: Internet financial fraud hits £121m

The Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG), which studies the internet scams, reported that nearly 40 new attacks were reported every day in May.

This represents a 700% rise in the number of attacks in January this year.

Most commonly, the phishers use spoofed emails to trick recipients into handing over bank account or other financial details. Spoofs claiming to come from US banks rose 170% in May month on month.

But while the threat is growing, most of the fraudsters use relatively unsophisticated methods to trick recipients.

APWG reports that 95% of bogus emails use forged ‘from’ addresses to hide the sender’s identity – so called domain spoofing.

‘Once ISPs start to verify the source of messages, a lot of bad things in email, including phishing, will be greatly reduced,’ said Dave Jevans, chairman, APWG.

Microsoft last week revealed plans to combat the problem of domain spoofing by introducing methods of checking the sender address with the IP address of the email, which is much harder to forge.

Share

Subscribe to get your daily business insights

Resources & Whitepapers

Why Professional Services Firms Should Ditch Folders and Embrace Metadata
Professional Services

Why Professional Services Firms Should Ditch Folders and Embrace Metadata

3y

Why Professional Services Firms Should Ditch Folde...

In the past decade, the professional services industry has transformed significantly. Digital disruptions, increased competition, and changing market ...

View resource
2 Vital keys to Remaining Competitive for Professional Services Firms

2 Vital keys to Remaining Competitive for Professional Services Firms

3y

2 Vital keys to Remaining Competitive for Professi...

In recent months, professional services firms are facing more pressure than ever to deliver value to clients. Often, clients look at the firms own inf...

View resource
Turn Accounts Payable into a value-engine
Accounting Firms

Turn Accounts Payable into a value-engine

3y

Turn Accounts Payable into a value-engine

In a world of instant results and automated workloads, the potential for AP to drive insights and transform results is enormous. But, if you’re still ...

View resource
Digital Links: A guide to MTD in 2021
Making Tax Digital

Digital Links: A guide to MTD in 2021

3y

Digital Links: A guide to MTD in 2021

The first phase of Making Tax Digital (MTD) saw the requirement for the digital submission of the VAT Return using compliant software. That’s now behi...

View resource