CAMBRIDGE, Mass.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The APWG reports in its new Phishing Activity Trends Report that
the number of phishing attacks surged during the 2015 holiday season.
Phishers unleashed a barrage of phishing scams in December 2015, in what
is now an annual attempt to part consumers from their money. During the
holiday season, the Retail / Service sector became the most-targeted
industry sector, while during the rest of the year, Internet Service
Providers (ISPs) had been the most-targeted industry sector.
There was also a major increase in PUPs – Potentially Unwanted Programs.
These are programs that are installed without the user’s consent, as
part of bundles with other software. Some of these programs are
malicious, or do not reveal what sensitive data they collect about the
user.
According to Luis Corrons, PandaLabs Technical Director and Trends
Report contributing analyst, PUPs accounted for nearly a third of
infections in the fourth quarter of 2015. Corrons noted: “Aggressive
distribution techniques and software programs used by PUPs means that
they achieve a high rate of installation in users’ computers. If we look
at the global percentage of infected computers, which is 35.45 percent,
we can see that it increased compared to previous quarters, and this was
mainly driven by PUPs.”
The full text of the report is available here: http://docs.apwg.org/reports/apwg_trends_report_q4_2015.pdf
The APWG membership will be convening June 1-3 in Toronto for their
annual general meeting and research conference to discuss these and
other issues related to the global cybercrime outlook: http://apwg.org/apwg-events/ecrime2016/
About the APWG
The APWG, founded in 2003 as the Anti-Phishing Working Group, is the
global industry, law enforcement, and government coalition of more than
1800 institutions working to unify the global response to electronic
crime. Since 2004, the APWG has developed and curated one of the world’s
largest NGO-managed clearinghouses of cybercrime event data yet
constructed. APWG’s directors, managers and research fellows advise and
correspond with: national governments; global governance bodies like the Organisation
for Economic Co-operation and Development, International
Telecommunications Union and ICANN;
hemispheric and global trade groups; and multilateral treaty
organizations such as the European
Commission, the G8 High Technology Crime Subgroup, Council
of Europe’s Convention on Cybercrime, United
Nations Office of Drugs and Crime, Organization
for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Europol
EC3 and the Organization
of American States. APWG is a member of the steering group of the Commonwealth
Cybercrime Initiative at the Commonwealth
of Nations. Membership is open to qualified financial institutions,
online retailers, ISPs and Telcos, the law enforcement community,
solutions providers, multi-lateral treaty organizations, research
centers, trade associations and government agencies. The APWG’s www.apwg.org
and education.apwg.org websites offer the public, industry and
government agencies practical information about phishing and
electronically mediated fraud as well as pointers to pragmatic technical
solutions that provide immediate protection. The APWG is co-founder and
co-manager of the STOP. THINK. CONNECT. Messaging Convention, the global
online safety public awareness collaborative https://education.apwg.org/safety-messaging-convention/
and founder/curator of the eCrime Researchers Summit, the world’s only
peer-reviewed conference dedicated specifically to electronic crime
studies www.ecrimeresearch.org.
Among APWG’s corporate sponsors are: AhnLab, Area 1, ATT (T), Afilias
Ltd., Avast!, AVG Technologies, Bangkok Bank, BBN Technologies,
Barracuda Networks, BillMeLater, Bkav, Blue Coat, BrandMail,
BrandProtect, Bsecure Technologies, CSC Digital Brand Services, Check
Point Software Technologies, Claro, Cloudmark, Comcast, CSIRTBANELCO,
Cyber Defender, Cyveillance, DigiCert, Domain Tools, Donuts, Easy
Solutions, eBay/PayPal (EBAY), eCert, EC Cert, ESET, EST Soft, Facebook,
FeelSafe Digital, FEBRABAN, Fortinet, FraudWatch International,
F-Secure, GetResponse, GlobalSign, GoDaddy, Google, GroupIB, Hauri,
Hitachi Systems, Ltd., Huawei Symantec, ICANN, Infoblox, IronPort, ING
Bank, Intuit, Interac, Internet.bs, IT Matrix, iThreat Cyber Group,
iZOOlogic, LaCaixa, Lenos Software, MailChannels, MailJet, MailChimp,
MailShell, MarkMonitor, M86Security, McAfee (MFE), Melbourne IT,
MessageLevel, Microsoft (MSFT), MicroWorld, Mimecast, Mirapoint, NHN,
MyPW, nProtect Online Security, Netcraft, Network Solutions, NeuStar,
Nominet, Nominum, Public Interest Registry, Panda Software, Phishlabs,
PhishMe, Planty.net, Prevelent, Prevx, Proofpoint, QinetiQ, RSA Security
(EMC), Rakuten, Return Path, RiskIQ, RuleSpace, SalesForce, SecureBrain,
SendGrid, S21sec, SIDN, SilverPop, SiteLock, SnoopWall, SoftForum,
SoftLayer, SoftSecurity, SOPHOS, SunTrust, SurfControl, Symantec (SYMC),
Tagged, TDS Telecom, Telefonica (TEF), TransCreditBank, Trend Micro
(TMIC), Trustwave, Vasco (VDSI), VADE-RETRO, VeriSign (VRSN), Wombat
Security Technologies, Yahoo! (YHOO), and zvelo.