This is all about phishing activity ready reference for anyone who like to learn about how phishing activities were being done. This is not only all about cryptocurrency but other financial institutions as well like bank accounts, credit cards and etc. I have made a quick search on why phishing activity were became successful and how much losses it made from the organizations and individuals that were became a victim of phishing.
Why these kinds of activity exist?In my own opinion phishing is one of the profitable business in the internet. It will only cost you little $ and big profits waits depending on the methods and technique in phishing being done. This is why there is a sudden increase of phishing activities that rampant here in this section of the forum.
How did it exist?The shared information of these phishing activities here in this section made me wonder what trigger these activities and how it did came successful to scam other people. As I continue the quick search on why it was so easy for them to conduct or make phishing activities. And here were the following reasons for the increase in phishing activity I read.
Reasons for the increase in Phishing Activities
Universal man-in-the-middle phishing kit - A tool that could create a sophisticated phishing site which is sold in underground market for about 1000$. According to RSA security that the kit could allow access to almost any web sites to be configured for phishing. It added that using the kit the researchers were able to create a fraudulent URL via a simple and user friendly user interface to which hacker novice can create a sophisticated phishing attack.
Lax password requirements - Not all the websites or online apps requires strict password like they allow passwords that are simple and easy to guess like username john123 and pass john123.
Fake giveaways - It could be easier to detect the common fake giveaways. Usually the common victims of these are from those social media like facebook, instagram, youtube and tweeter. However, it could be easy to spot like having a newly created account, using famous logo or brand name, stealing images, the account had no recent activity or does not have that much numbers of followers and the giveaway asks you to complete too many tasks.
Key-logging software - sometimes referred to as keylogging or keyboard capturing, from the name itself simply shows capturing keyboard strokes from the user’s keyboard and store it in a small file which will then later on send to the hackers email or save it for viewing later. This is done by which person using the keyboard is completely unaware that their actions are being monitored.
High return Investment Scheme - “ The return on investment in phishing is phenomenal” this according to Lohman(2006). High yield investment programs (HYIPs) are usually an investment that promise unreasonably high returns. This is done by invites where new investor paid old investors and consider it as profits. HYIP operators uses social media including facebook, twitter, youtube and instagram to appeal on their victims and create the illusion of social consensus surrounding the legitimacy of these programs.
Therefore we can expect that with the volume of targeted victims it can earn huge of this fraudulent activity which is phishing that made me wonder I too should start my own Phishing business. LOLThese phishing activities had been effective due to applied methods. These methods were became known after some reports noted in the news on how the victims were able to get phished out of their accounts (banks and financial institutions specifically). This methods were being mention by ITU(2005) and Chawki(2006).
Methods of PhishingDragnet Method - This method involves the use of spammed emails, bearing falsified corporate identification (e.g Trademarks, logos, and corporate names), that are addressed to a large class of people (e.g., customers of a particular financial institution or members of a particular auction site) to websites or pop-up windows where they are requested to enter bank or credit card account data or other personal data.
Rod-and-Reel method – This method targets prospective victims and conveys false information to them that could lead them to disclose their personal and financial data. For example, online items that are available and are cheaper to which the victims were looking for and upon visiting the webpage then the victims were then ask to disclose personal information including financial aspect to proceed with the transaction.
Lobsterpot Method - This method focuses upon the use of fake sites(imitating sites). This is usually done by a phisher placing deceptiveURL address/links to a scam website. Once the victim is into this fake site then the victim might send personal details or financial access of the victims account.
Gillnet Phishing - In gillnet Phishing, phishers introduce malicious code into emails and websites. They can, for example misuse browser functionality by injecting hostile content into another site’s pop – up window. Merely by opening a particular email, or browsing a particular website, Internet users may have a Trojan horse introduced into their systems.
How Phishing is accomplished?Here is an example of 2004-2007 statistics on phishing activities.
Statistics of Phishing with respect to non banking institutions
Top list of phishing email reportsTop Phishing sites hosting countriesTop brands affected by phising during 2003, 2004, 2006 & 2007
Related Articles:I thought the OP was going to expand later on to see include some more up-to-date statistics on phishing. The statistics presented are pretty old, and although the pretend some preliminary context, the numbers must be pretty far from nowadays reality. It would be interesting if you search around for something more 2020’s, such as:
By the way, just a reminder included in the above reference:
In Q1 2020, a new high of 74 percent of sites used for phishing were protected with SSL. "The majority of phishing web sites continue to use SSL/TLS,"said John LaCour, Founder and CTO, PhishLabs."We hope that users have learned that SSL doesn’t mean a site is legitimate".
The phishing activities clearly resembles huge losses to the organizations or individulas. This is why in cryptocurrency where these activities are present we should tend to be more careful. This is why I made this posts for you ready reference about phishing acticity. The information above are from the following references listed below. All of it were done in a quick search using google and the internet.
Resources :
https://www.itproportal.com/2007/01/10/universal-maninthemiddle-phishing-kit-discovered/https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/keystroke_logginghttps://www.ques10.com/p/49373/methods-of-phishing-1/https://www.easypromosapp.com/blog/en/2019/09/fake-instagram-giveaways/https://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/high-yield-investment-program.aspGoogle pictures/internet