From: InfoSec News (alertsinfosecnews.org)
Date: Thu Dec 17 2009 - 02:07:54 CST

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http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/121609-five-things-you-need-to.html

By Robert McMillan
IDG News Service
December 16, 2009

SOCIAL ENGINEERING IS GROWING UP. Social engineering, the act of
tricking people into giving up sensitive information, is nothing new.
Convicted hacker Kevin Mitnick made a name for himself by cold-calling
staffers at major U.S. companies and talking them into giving him
information. But today's criminals are having a heyday using e-mail and
social networks. A well-written phishing message or virus-laden spam
campaign is a cheap, effective way for criminals to get the data they
need.

TARGETED ATTACKS ARE ON THE RISE. Northrop Grumman recently reported
that China was "likely" stealing data from the United States in a "long-
term, sophisticated network exploitation campaign." Security experts
have noticed criminals were "spear phishing"--getting Trojan horse
programs to run on a victim's computer by using carefully crafted e-mail
messages. Used to steal intellectual property and state secrets, spear
phishing is now everywhere.

CASTING A BROAD NET PAYS OFF TOO. Less discriminating criminals cast a
wider net with their attacks. They pick e-mail subjects everybody's
interested in: a message from the IRS, or even "a photo of you." The
more victims who click links and install the bad guy's software, the
more money the criminals make. Right now, "they're doing it with
messaging that is extremely broad," says Gary Warner, director of
research in computer forensics at the University of Alabama at
Birmingham.

[...]

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