What is a Phishing Scam?

I have an option with my e-mail inbox where I can report a phishing scam within the junk menu. What is a Phishing Scam?What is a Phishing Scam?
If you get an email from an organisation trying to get you to part with banking details and passwords - that's phishing.



No reputable bank will ask you to supply these details through an email or in whole.
It's when you use feathers or brightly coloured objects as bait when fishing instead of worms, protect the fish from being scammedWhat is a Phishing Scam?
Phishing is something that is designed to make you hand over your personal details, it may be a password or something even like a credit card number. Or it could even be someone trying to get money from you for some strange reason like they are in debt or something strange.
A phishing scam is a website that pretends to help you out with something so you give them your details. Then they take your details and do things with them. e.g passwords, logins for websites, and others.What is a Phishing Scam?
usually when a website or an email looks like a real email or website from a real company. What phishing is, is that it tries to trick people to give their information to people that you may not know and steal your banking information or other private stuff. They cause lots of identity theft, so if you report an email as a "phisher" you help you email client get rid of email of the same sender and other people's mailboxes as well.
An email trying to con you into giving it info or cash.They also

put false web sites up.Like Yahoo to get your passwords and

get into your pc.
Its where you recieve email from people who are pretending to be a paticular site, for example, eBay, when you recieve a message that looks to be from eBay and has the same layout it could be from anyone using different, cleverly worded websites that include the word eBay to make you think when you click on a link from that paticular email that you are on the real thing..



E.g. Using eBay again, From this fake email you have recieved (unaware) you then click on sign in for example, when you enter your details, the scammers can use your details to sign in on the REAL site and commit fraud.



It easy to tell though if you know the address you should be visiting and try not to follow links but type them yourself. Half the time there lame *** attempts that can be spotted a mile off.
A phishing scam is an identity theft scam that arrives via email. The email appears to come from a legitimate source such as a trusted business or financial institution, and includes an urgent request for personal information usually invoking some critical need to update an account immediately. Clicking on a link provided in the email leads to an official-looking website. Personal information provided to this site, however, goes directly to the scam artist.



Fraud is a growing problem on the internet as people are tricked into providing personal information including credit card numbers, passwords, Mother’s maiden name, bank account numbers, ATM pass codes and social security numbers. Virus protectors and firewalls do not catch most phishing scams because they do not contain suspect code, while spam filters let them pass because they appears to come from legitimate sources.



The links included in phishing scams take the unsuspecting person to a fraudulent website designed to mimic the real thing, often down to the smallest detail including copyright notices, submenu titles and so on. It’s virtually impossible for most people to tell they are the target of a phisher by looking at the site alone. However, clues in the address can sometimes reveal the deception.



Similar looking characters might be substituted in the spelling of the link for the real character so that a “1” (numeral one) is used in place of a lower-case “L.” For example, phishers have used paypa1.com rather than paypal.com. Other times an IP address – a numerical address – is used to hide the fact that the link is not taking the victim to the real site. However, phishing scams have become so sophisticated that phishers can also appear to be using legitimate links, right down to the real site’s security certificate.



The best way to protect yourself from phishing scams is to avoid supplying personal information to an email request. If you believe the request might be legitimate, call the company’s customer service department to verify this before providing any information, but do not use phone numbers contained in the email (if any are included). Even if the request is legitimate, manually enter the required address in your browser rather than clicking on a link, as a phisher scam could conceivably run concurrent with legitimate business.



For example, in early April 2005 a mass emailing that appeared to be from Microsoft Corporation urged recipients to download a much anticipated security update. Those that clicked on the link in the email were taken to a site that looked like a legitimate Microsoft update site. However, instead of updating their software they were actually downloading a Trojan horse (a remote access program that can steal personal information). Microsoft does not use email notification in this way but many were caught unaware.



The famous “letter from Nigeria” was another type of phishing scam. This type of scam is so prevalent, it has its own name: 419 scam. The phisher pretends to be a Nigerian official in distress requiring a U.S. bank account to offload money. The person who allowed temporary use of their account would receive a handsome reward. Instead those who provided their banking information become victims of theft.



PC World reported that research firm Gartner found phishing scams are costing consumers $2 billion a year. While the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and others have concentrated on public education, the Anti-Phishing Act of 2005 was proposed by U.S. Senator Patrick Leahey (D- Vermont). This would make the creation and use of email addresses and websites that are intended to spoof legitimate businesses for purpose of procuring personal information punishable by fines and jail time. However, catching phishers is difficult. Fraudulent sites operate for very short periods of time and scams are often run from other countries. In March 2005 Microsoft filed 117 phishing lawsuits in the Western District of Washington with unnamed defendants.



The Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) is an international organization of volunteers working to track phishing scams. Their website keeps an online database of fraudulent emails submitted to them. You can check this site for new scams, or send them phisher email you receive. The APWG is largely an information hub but they do provide links to consumer resources. The FTC also has advice for consumers, an email address for reporting phishing, plus a form to report identity theft.



Companies that have been spoofed by phishing scams include: Microsoft Corp., MSN, eBay, Amazon.com, PayPal, AOL, Comcast, CitiBank, Wells Fargo Bank, Bank of America, Washington Mutual, and many more.
When someone send you an email saying that you won something or they will give you Millions of dolars but they need all your personal banking stuff to put the money in there



in other words, you give them your personal bank stuff and they just take all your cash away
ways to avoid being scammed by a fish is to never login to your account using a link in an e-mail always type the link in your browser and login manually.
A phishing scam is phony website made to look like a genuine one. The usual procedure is to send an e-mail to you supposedly from your bank/Pay pal/Ebay/building society etc.requesting details. This mail will have an instruction to click on a link which will take you to a website that has been carefully constructed to look like the genuine article. On this website you will be asked all manner of details,bank account No. password etc.

Quite often there will be a "frightener" such as "Your account will be frozen if you do not respond".

None of the institutions I have mentioned will ever send you an e-mail with such a link,so NEVER ever click on such a link and never ever give any details away or you will find your bank balance at zero or have your identity stolen to open other accounts,get credit etc.