Beware of phishing on the ghost festival day

Hackers set up scary websites on ghost festivals (Halloween) to attract funny people and spread dangerous spyware .

Websence experts say this is a traditional "typo-attack" attack with a website as a "bait" that leads to a website containing malicious code. Users can easily find websites of this type via Google search engine.

The BMW brand has been turned into a trap by hackers to entice unsuspecting internet users.

Hackers also take advantage of errors in keywords to deceive users, for example the word 'halloween' is written as 'halkoween'.

Sophos has also warned of scams that are considered "variants" of this "Nigerian scam". The attacker sent the victim an e-mail informing him that he had won a BMW car with 950,000 euros and was accompanied by a request to contact the "confirmation department" (including the address, e-mail and phone number).

This scam, as well as Nigerian scam, aims to steal the victim's bank account information.

Sophos said this is not the first time a famous car brand has been brought out by hackers. Also this year, the name Volkswagen was taken advantage of to distribute spam.

Sophos experts claim that this lottery is becoming an effective offensive weapon for hackers because many people are too mercenary but caught off guard. Meanwhile, BMW can hardly do anything to protect its name and the number of people getting trapped is increasing.

According to Sophos, the best way to prevent this scam is that computer users do not respond to suspicious emails.

Content of fraudulent letter:

Dear winner,

We would like to announce that you have won 950,000 euros and a BMW5 car in the international program held today, October 26, 2006 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

The selection is done randomly on our e-mail system with a database containing over 250,000 e-mail addresses from all continents in the world. And you are the chosen one.

The BMW lottery program is accredited by the Netherlands Gaming Board and is copyright protected by the International Association of Gaming Regulators (IAGR).

This is the third time we have organized this program for the purpose of impressing the public.

To receive the prize, you need to contact our confirmation department for more information about the award procedure.
HOANG MINH