A higher than expected percentage of internet users are falling victim to
phishing scams, US academics claimed today.
Researchers at
Indiana
University's
School
of Informatics said that phishers targeting US adults could be netting
responses from as much as 14 per cent of the targeted users per attack.
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The university's study simulated phishing tactics used to elicit online
information from
eBay customers.
The online auction giant was selected because of its millions of users, and
because it is one of the most popular targets of phishing scams.
The researchers noted that recent surveys by the
Gartner
Group suggest that about three per cent of adult Americans are successfully
targeted by phishing attacks each year.
But this amount might be conservative given that many users are reluctant to
admit falling for such a scam, or may even be unaware of it.
Other surveys may have resulted in overestimates of the risks because of a
misunderstanding of what constitutes identity theft.
"Our goal was to determine the success rates of different types of phishing
attacks, not just the types used today but those that have not yet occurred in
the wild," said Markus Jakobsson, associate professor at the IU School of
Informatics.
Jakobsson is also an associate director of the IU Center for Applied
Cybersecurity Research, which studies and develops countermeasures to Internet
fraud.
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