A Way to Stop Phishing at the Pier
by Barbara Hurst, BOL GuruGuru Bios
Given the speed that phishing attacks change addresses and schemes, the current company IT practice of guarding against those attacks by using black lists simply can't keep up. But companies now have a new weapon they can offer customers or use to guard employees against those attacks. The tool can prescreen web sites through a user's browser and based on a number of risk factors, warn the user and even stop them temporarily from accessing a spoofed site.
eBay has tested and is now offering a version of one such tool - Web Caller ID - free to its customers. The user-friendly technology, which eBay calls Account Guard, is downloaded by customers, who don't see its effects until an attack occurs and the customer prepares to respond. With the new technology, when someone sends one of the fake emails that link to legitimate-looking web sites, the customer's browser analyzes the site before it actually goes there and detects factors such as whether the domain name was recently registered, how deep the web site is, whether an IP address is at the beginning of the URL, what the site's page history is, and other characteristics common to phishing sites. It then alerts the user and can be configured to require them to proactively decide to go to the web page despite warnings.
Meanwhile, spoof sites are reported back to the company that offers the service, allowing those companies to take immediate action. According to the company that offers the tool - WholeSecurity - it is 98 percent accurate in identifying spoofs and a fraction of a percent false-positive.
Copyright © 2004 Bankers' Hotline. Originally appeared in Bankers' Hotline, Vol. 14, No. 07, 10/04
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