Co-Author: Ashish Diwakar

The next FIFA World Cup is scheduled to take place in June 2014 in Brazil and phishers have already taken the opportunity to promote the event. World Cups are a favorite of phishers, as observed in the phishing sites focused on the 2010 FIFA World Cup and the 2011 Cricket World Cup. In September 2012, phishing sites spoofed a popular Brazilian credit and debit card company using the 2014 FIFA World Cup as bait.
 

The phishing sites were in Brazilian Portuguese. A number of the phishing sites featured Brazilian footballer Neymar da...

Celebrities are frequently featured in phishing sites. Now, phishers have taken an interest in targeting French users by using teenage celebrities as bait. Some of the celebrities recently used as bait were the singers Jojo, Justin Bieber, and Zac Efron. The phishing sites were hosted on free Web hosting sites.

In the first example, the phishing site spoofed the login page of an email service of a popular information services brand. The phishing page contained an image of Jojo and the contents of the page were altered to promote the singer. The legitimate brand does not promote any celebrities, but phishers modified the contents of the page to entice users. Phishers believe that by using popular celebrities they can gain a larger audience, which increases their chances of harvesting user credentials. After the login credentials have been entered, users are redirected to the legitimate website.

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Contributor: Peter Coogan

A strain of financial banking Trojans which runs browser-based man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks has reared its ugly head once again. Trojan.Shylock is sophisticated malware which utilizes fake digital certificates and intercepts network traffic to inject code into banking websites. It tricks users into providing login and account details to cybercriminals. Recently, it has developed new tricks to steal user information.

Back in February, Trusteer published a blog stating that Trojan.Shylock had been observed injecting JavaScript which displayed a web-based chat screen to unsuspecting victims. The hackers controlled the chat screen and proceeded to query the victim for login credentials or other information required to gain access...

Co-author: Avdhoot Patil

Phishing sites using celebrities as bait are on a rampage. In July 2012, Honey Singh, also known as Yo Yo Honey Singh, a popular Indian rapper, singer, music producer, and actor was featured on phishing sites. Symantec observed several phishing sites that spoofed a social networking brand that claimed to have an application for Honey Singh. The phishing sites were hosted by a free web hosting service.

The phishing sites promoted Honey Singh’s 2011 album, International Villager. A poster of the album's artwork was displayed on the left side of the phishing page and the login form was displayed on the right side. The phishing sites claimed to have an application that enabled users to listen to the Punjabi star's latest songs and videos. As with most applications on social networking sites, the application made a request to the user before allowing access. After a user's login credentials were entered into the phishing...