Security Response

We are currently in the process of compiling the upcoming Symantec Internet Security Threat Report. I am putting together the phishing sections for the Asia-Pacific and Europe, Africa, and Middle East ISTRs. One of the things that we've noticed is that there are several instances of very small countries hosting high numbers of phishing Web sites. Obviously this raised the question of why this would be.

After we'd gone through related data—bot-infected computers, spam zombies, phishing hosts, etc.—we couldn't come up with any data that would explain this emerging phenomenon. We asked ourselves what in the political-economic profiles of these small nations would make them attractive for, or susceptible to, phishing Web sites, when one of our analysts pointed out that they are often used to host online gambling sites. In part, this is because gambling sites that use real money (as opposed to free poker sites, for instance) are illegal...