Phishers migrating to Trojan horse attacks

TechWorld.com - The latest report (download PDF) from the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) suggests a depressing if unsurprising outlook for phishing trends in the year ahead.
Figures for November, the most recent available from the organization, show a 28% growth in phishing scams over the four previous months. A total of 1,518 sites were active during the month, and most of them were based in the U.S. and Asia.
The average time online was only 6.2 days, but the longest managed to stay up and running for 31 days, and 51 companies had their brands hijacked in an effort by scammers to hook potential victims.
The APWG said it was most concerned that phishers are increasingly using "technical subterfuge" -- Trojan horse keyloggers -- in favor of old-fashioned social engineering attacks. That marks a step up in sophistication because such attacks are extremely difficult to defend against and can snare even experienced Internet users.
Keylogging Trojan horses are likely to be a defining characteristic of phishing over the next 12 months.
"We've already seen indications that phishers are ... commanding automated distribution systems, apparently leveraging botnets, known as zombies," APWG Chairman David Jevans said. "Those resources, combined with conventional key logging and other innovative malicious code, is a threat scenario that could deliver more sophisticated attacks."
Although around 75% of attacks are aimed at financial institutions, it's clear that no sector can consider itself safe. The report outlines a Nov. 3 attack on customers of Internet service provider EarthLink Inc. and on Microsoft Corp.'s MSN.com a week later. The common factor is that the targeted online enterprise has a financial relationship with its users and is of sufficient size to warrant being attacked.