Rise in Tax-Related Online Phishing Scams

Aloha and Welcome to Today’s WOW Technology Minute

This is the season for paying taxes and watching out for online scumbags.

As the April 15th tax filing deadline approaches, cyber-scumbags are planning attacks on nice people simply trying to pay the man, online. That’s right tax filers, you’re the target of these scumbags and we’ve got some help.

Today Websense Security Labs announced that they have seen a rise in phishing attacks via fraudulent emails and websites that spoof the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Websense has discovered targeted attacks originating outside the U.S. from compromised machines overseas.

An example of one of these Phishing scams would be an email claiming that you’re eligible for a tax refund. If you follow the link to confirm, you get forwarded to a fraudulent site that requests personal information. Here’s the important part -You don’t have to give any information for the Phishing scheme to work. You only have to be on their site long enough for them to compromise your machine.

From Aloha Workshops on the Big Island of Hawaii, this is Brent Norris for The World Organization of Webmasters and The WOW Technology Minute.

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