Anti-phishing 'posses' hunt criminals
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger last Friday signed into law the first state legislation that penalizes fraudsters who steal online identities through "phishing" scams, but Internet companies and banks are not waiting for the law to stop the cyber-criminals and are actively taking covert measures to protect their customers, experts tell UPI's The Web.
We generally find that law enforcement is so involved with other issues that phishing is low on their priority list," said Hugh Hyndman, chief operating officer of Toronto-based Brand Dimensions, an online brand consulting company, in an interview with The Web.
So private-sector companies are setting up private posses to chase down the cyber thieves. They are working with Internet service providers, Web-hosting services and even regional Internet authorities to alert them when a phishing phenomenon is discerned online -- when thousands of suspicious e-mails are sent from a site purporting to be a U.S. credit union but that originate in the Far East. They track down the very server that the fraudulent e-mail is coming from -- by its IP, or Internet Protocol address, and then work with established contacts to shut down the site and take it offline as soon as possible.
posted by Fergie @ 10/05/2005 09:53:00 AM
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