TOI Tech | Jun 4, 2011, 12.42 pm IST
NEW DELHI: Users of Yahoo and Hotmail email have also been hit by the same kind of targeted attacks as were disclosed by Google earlier this week, according to security vendor Trend Micro.
In a blog post Trend Micro says, "Google recently revealed details surrounding a successful phishing campaign that targeted the Gmail accounts of government officials and of political activists. While there has been significant media coverage of the incident, there has been a variety of recent attacks on popular Webmail platforms. In addition to Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail have also been targeted."
According to Trend Micro while the attacks appear to have been separately conducted, they have some significant similarities.
Trend Micro believes that the objective of the attackers appears to be to gain access to the target's Webmail accounts in order to monitor his/her communications and, possibly, to stage future attacks. In the recent case revealed by Google, the attackers used a phishing attack to gain access to the target's Gmail account then proceeded to add their own email addresses to the "forwarding and delegation settings allowing them to send and receive email messages via the compromised accounts.
In addition to this recent phishing attack, Google also previously revealed that attackers are exploiting a vulnerability in the MHTML protocol in order to target political activists who use Google's services. At the same time, Google revealed that the same technique was being used against users of "another popular social site."
While this other website has not been identified, it has been reported that this MHTML exploit was being directed against Gmail users and that the initial phishing message was being propagated through Facebook. These attacks targeted journalists and political activists. Like the recent phishing attacks, the attackers modified the delegation settings so they can continue to monitor the compromised Gmail accounts.
Google's services haven't been the only ones targeted. Trend Micro researchers in Taiwan revealed a phishing attack that exploited a vulnerability in Microsoft's Hotmail service. In fact, rather than clicking a malicious link, even the simple act of previewing the malicious email message can compromise a user's account. This phishing email pretended to be from the Facebook security team.
Source
In a blog post Trend Micro says, "Google recently revealed details surrounding a successful phishing campaign that targeted the Gmail accounts of government officials and of political activists. While there has been significant media coverage of the incident, there has been a variety of recent attacks on popular Webmail platforms. In addition to Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail have also been targeted."
According to Trend Micro while the attacks appear to have been separately conducted, they have some significant similarities.
Trend Micro believes that the objective of the attackers appears to be to gain access to the target's Webmail accounts in order to monitor his/her communications and, possibly, to stage future attacks. In the recent case revealed by Google, the attackers used a phishing attack to gain access to the target's Gmail account then proceeded to add their own email addresses to the "forwarding and delegation settings allowing them to send and receive email messages via the compromised accounts.
In addition to this recent phishing attack, Google also previously revealed that attackers are exploiting a vulnerability in the MHTML protocol in order to target political activists who use Google's services. At the same time, Google revealed that the same technique was being used against users of "another popular social site."
While this other website has not been identified, it has been reported that this MHTML exploit was being directed against Gmail users and that the initial phishing message was being propagated through Facebook. These attacks targeted journalists and political activists. Like the recent phishing attacks, the attackers modified the delegation settings so they can continue to monitor the compromised Gmail accounts.
Google's services haven't been the only ones targeted. Trend Micro researchers in Taiwan revealed a phishing attack that exploited a vulnerability in Microsoft's Hotmail service. In fact, rather than clicking a malicious link, even the simple act of previewing the malicious email message can compromise a user's account. This phishing email pretended to be from the Facebook security team.
Source
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