Microsoft MSN offers scam detector

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They are building it into IE 7

And they're offering it as part of their MSN Toolbar to IE6 users. Anything will help the majority of users who are just too trusting.

The phishing scammers are making the e-mails they send out look very believable. I have seen a number of them at client sites and they are HTML e-mail messages that actually grab images (logos, etc.) from the real websites. I have seen them purporting to be from Citigroup, Bank One, Bank of America, Smith Barney, PayPal, and others. They always seem to claim some sort of server failure or upgrade, and the need for the user to click a link in the e-mail to log in to the system to 'activate' their account or some such nonsense.

I have been training my clients' users (where they have switched to Thunderbird for their e-mail client) to hover over the link and check the status bar. The status bar shows the actual link target, and in these e-mails it never matches the link text in the message. I tell them if it doesn't match, don't click it! It's interesting how GeoIP shows these link targets to be in Europe or Asia, when it is supposedly a U.S. bank!

I also tell them that no institution will actually send you an e-mail asking for your password - they don't need it (or know it), and they really couldn't care less what it is.

At any rate, anything that might help make users stop and think could help. Too bad many users just click 'OK' reflexively because those stupid messages are in the way and slowing them down....

Posted by: Hugh Jass   Posted on: 08/26/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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