Fraudsters Launch Surprise Mass Phishing Attacks Against New Bank Targets
Banks that have been almost "untouched" are suddenly bombarded by multiple attacks
Cyota, the leading provider of anti-fraud and security solutions for financial institutions, today revealed an important change in the rapidly growing phishing arena - a change, which may affect the way some banks view phishing, and how they prepare for it. Cyota's Anti-Fraud Command Center (AFCC), which monitors online fraud on behalf of Cyota's clients, has identified that phishing attacks have begun shifting focus to new targeted banks. Fraudsters have begun attacking banks that have hardly been attacked till now, and hitting them suddenly in mass numbers. While previously fraudsters gradually increased the number of attacks on a given bank, now the AFCC is seeing very sudden and rapid growth against new targets. Over the past three months, several large to mid-sized banks in the US have seen a growth of thousands of percents in the amount of phishing attacks against them.
Cyota's 24x7 AFCC constantly monitors and analyzes online fraud and phishing in order to provide its clients with FraudAction(TM). FraudAction is the company's anti-phishing service, including real-time alerts, detailed severity assessments, site shutdown services, forensic work and proprietary counter-measures. In addition, the AFCC, which supports Cyota's various anti-fraud and security services, identifies and analyzes new trends in the phishing and online fraud industry in order to develop suitable solutions that allow financial institutions to be prepared and respond accordingly. Today, Cyota services some of the largest banks in the world with its suite of anti-fraud solutions.
Phishing is spreading, attacking new institutions in mass numbers, catching some by surprise. While initially phishing attacks focused on a few of the largest financial institutions, recently there has been a change in the targeted entities. As the leading banks have begun to deal with phishing and deploy solutions, such as Cyota's FraudAction service, and as phishing tools become more available, including Do-It-Yourself phishing kits sold on the Internet, there has been a recent change in target - phishing is spreading to financial institutions that were not attacked previously. The uniqueness of this trend and what causes alarm is the fact that fraudsters attack the less-suspecting targets with 'surprise attacks' - multiple, subsequent hits, thus catching some financial institutions off guard and capturing as much stolen information as possible in a very short timeframe. Cyota's AFCC recently spotted several such cases where hundreds of attacks were launched within 3 months, compared to 1-10 attacks total against the same entities in the months before.
"Banks can no longer assume that they will have time to better protect themselves after their first phishing incident. They must be pro-active in preparing in advance as phishing and online fraud continue to evolve and spread with little early warning," said Amir Orad, Cyota Executive Vice President of Marketing "With the right preparation, including deployment of solutions like Cyota's FraudAction and putting new procedures in place, banks will be prepared to deal with the problem before it catches them by surprise. Cyota is already working with some of the largest institutions in the world to protect them against phishing and fraud, and we are determined to keep our customers ready and always one step ahead of the fraudsters."
Source: press release
Permalink: Fraudsters Launch Surprise Mass Phishing Attacks Against New Bank Targets
