Week in review 27 March 2015

This week we had two Amazon phishing scams, one American Express scam, an ANZ scam and the obligatory PayPal scam. Read on for our week in review. As always, you can click on a link to see the story in full, together with screenshots of the phishing emails in question.

Confirm account phishing email requests

And we started the week with a PayPal phishing email. This one tells you that your PayPal account needs to be confirmed, due to some unspecified “unusual activity”. Due to this, the email says, your account has been disabled. Of course, if you click on the link, you can resolve the issue. It’s all a big scam. The email is a fake and can be deleted.

Amazon account potentially limited

We have not seen many Amazon phishing email campaigns this year. This one was the first concentrated attack. The phishing email uses the line of “we upgraded our security, now you have to confirm your account by clicking on this link”, or words to that effect. But the threat that your Amazon account may be limited is used as an inducement to try to trick people into clicking on the link. This is another scam.

Beware Amazon gift card scam

We don’t get an Amazon phishing campaign in months, then two in two days. This one was a gift card scam, and used established marketing techniques to try to trick users into surrendering personal details. In return, the email promises a $50 gift card. It is all a scam.

Email Address Updated Says Phishing email

American Express customers were the targets of this phishing email. The email informs customers that their email address has been updated, and thanks them for doing so. It also provides a link and tells customers they can update their email address via the link. It is all a ruse. The link in the email leads to a phishing site, designed to steal customer details.

Please review account phishing email

And finally, there was this ANZ phishing email. Taking a look at it we got the strong impression that it was a cut and paste from a PowerPoint slide. The email informs the customer that the ANZ have launched a new security system. Now it is time for the customer to do their part. All the customer need do is click on a link, but the link is to a malicious site. This is another phishing email scam.

Scott Reeves
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