Hijacked Brands Reach Record Level In Q4

Cybercrime syndicates are expanding the base of brands they exploit for online fraud beyond major financial institutions and online merchants, according to a new report from the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG).

The number of hijacked brands reached a record 356 in October, up nearly 4.4 percent from the previous record of 341 in August 2009.

"No brand is safe from the threat of spoofing for the purposes of online fraud. Once, only the largest banks were targeted," said Peter Cassidy, APWG Secretary General.

"Now, every kind of enterprise from banks and credit unions of all sizes to charities to, in a recent case, a hardware manufacturer, are now seeing their brands exploited in all manner of fraud scheme."

While the number of unique phishing reports submitted to the APWG in Q4 declined nearly 29 percent from a record high of 40,621 in August, dropping to 28,897 reports in December, the stats don't reflect a more troubling trend. Member reports to APWG and research reviews in Q3 and Q4, reveal a significant increase in phishing focused on high value targets such as people in charge of finances.

"Spear-phishing and whale-phishing, where targeted individuals inside of corporations, or of high net worth, appears to be increasing," said Dave Jevans, APWG Chairman.

"Phishers and malware attackers are sending emails to individuals in a highly targeted fashion, attempting to gain access to corporate online banking systems, corporate VPN networks, and other online resources."

"These attacks do not contribute significantly to the overall number of unique phishing emails that are sent, as they are not using broad-based spam. Rather, the attackers customize their email messages to target individual users," Jevans said.
 

 

More Email Marketers Using Video

Small and medium-sized business (SMB) marketers are becoming increasingly convinced of the positive results of video email, social media and personalization, according to a new report from GetResponse.

Over 80 percent of respondents plan to use video emails in 2010 and over 90 percent of SMB marketers who use video emails report it delivers significant conversion rates.

More than half of respondents said video emails can increase click-through rates. One in three marketers believes video can improve brand image and increase customer loyalty. Over 20 percent of marketers believe that video emails can also reduce support and training costs. Only 4.7 percent of email marketers do no see any benefits from using video email.

"Today's marketers are mindful of the importance of delivering relevant content and one-to-one messaging based on preferences and behaviors," said Simon Grabowski, founder of

GetResponse

.

"It's all about putting the 'human element' back into marketing through the use of video and social media conversations."

Other highlights from the survey include:

 

•   Social media: A 113.2 percent increase in use of links to new messages on social media pages; a 109.1 percent increase in use of sign-up forms on Facebook, etc. fan pages; 88.8 percent will increase share options and 71.6 percent  more will place "follow us" links in email messages.
•   Personalization: 53.80 percent of SMB respondents said they intend to increase targeting and personalization in 2010; 52.40 percent will try to improve email title and subject line personalization.
•   Behavioral targeting: Nearly 75 percent of marketers claim that behavioral targeting can result in significant or moderate increases in email marketing effectiveness. Only 2.8 percent did not consider behavioral targeting an effective practice.

Google Talks Spam Control for Buzz

Update: WebProNews contacted Google to find out how they handle Google Buzz spam. The company tells us:

"We have several spam and abuse checks in place for Google Buzz content. On the abuse side, we recompress images that are uploaded, and links are scanned by the same technology that helps protect Google web search and browsers that implement our Safe Browsing data. Users can also click "Report abuse" in the drop-down menu for each Buzz message. We will suspend accounts for abuse that violates our terms of service."

"Email messages and buzz posts are inherently different in that anyone with your email address can spam you, but you choose who to follow in Buzz. If someone is following you whom you consider spammy, you can always block them. We think the bigger potential for spam is in comments, and we have spam and abuse detection in place to combat this."

Original Article: Last week, Google launched the much talked about Google Buzz, its new social media product that ties into users' Gmail accounts (among other things). Privacy issues have been widely discussed (and addressed accordingly by Google), but Security firm Websense tells us that spammers are already exploiting the service as well.

"With all the buzz last week about Google Buzz, we were just waiting for malicious activity to show up on the newly launched service," a Websense representative told WebProNews. "We didn't quite expect it to happen this fast. Last Friday we saw the first spam using Google Buzz to spread a message about smoking."

"The spammer was already following 237 people, and we can only imagine that he or she has sent similar messages to all of them," she added. "This particular message leads to a site hosted on a free Web hosting service talking about how to quit smoking."

It goes to show that spammers waste no time in exploiting new opportunities, and something as big as a Google social network is sure to have a great deal of potential victims.

"When Twitter was launched, it took a while before it was used to send spam and other malicious messages," the representative said. "In this case, it only took two days. It's clear that the bad guys have learned from their experience using social networks to distribute these type of messages. We hope that Google is geared up for dealing with the volume of spam it's bound to see on the new service. Until then, we advise users to be careful, as usual, when clicking on unknown links."

Carl Leonard, Security Research Manager EMEA, Websense says, "It's worrying that spammers have an improved knowledge of social networks these days that allows them to hit new services like Google Buzz so rapidly. Users want to communicate through multiple channels and use social media tools as part of their everyday lives including at work, but it's important they are savvy to potential threats."

We've contacted Google about its efforts for combating Google Buzz spam. We don't know how widespread a problem this is. I haven't noticed any spam in my own Buzz account yet, and its hard to say how common it is. I would say, however, that the best precaution you can probably take is to only follow people you trust. We'll update this post when we hear back from Google on the subject.

Google uses Buzz in its own real-time search results, which will show up in SERPs for many newsy or "buzzy" (if you will) queries, but Google is generally pretty good at keeping spam in its search results to a minimum. When Google's real-time search first launched, the spam quickly followed, but I can't say I've seen much in the way of spam showing up here anytime recently. As I write this, I'm watching the " Mardi Gras " results roll in, and I'm not seeing anything that doesn't appear legitimate (spammers are often quick to exploit events).

Have you witnessed any Google Buzz spam? Comment here.

Gmail Gives Users New Default Text Styling Feature

Google has introduced a new Gmail Labs feature, which gives Gmail users control over the default style of their text. In other words, you can set how you like your text to appear normally, and it will automatically appear that way.

"In the early days of email, messages were simple text meant to be read on a terminal. But with the growth of the web came the advent of HTML email, and overnight people began expressing themselves through bold and italics, colors and images, and whatever else their creativity inspired," Google says. "If you like to use a specific text style for your messages, you've had to change the font every time you're about to start typing out an email."

The purpose of this new Labs feature is to change that. If you turn the feature on, you can easily control how your message looks and alter that setting when you need to.

"If you live and breathe code, now you can set your default text style to a monospace font. If your life is purple, your email can be, too," the company adds. "But remember: whatever you see is what your recipients will see, so be nice to them and try not to clog the intertubes with ginormous bold italicized red script."

Just like with any other Gmail Labs feature, you will need to go to the Labs tab in your settings and activate it. If you've not messed around with Gmail's Labs features, you will likely find some other useful features to activate as well.


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