New ways to “phish” for your private information

According to Wikipedia “phishing” is a form of social engineering, characterized by attempts to fraudulently acquire sensitive information, such as passwords and credit card details, by masquerading as a trustworthy person or business in an apparently official electronic communication, such as an email or an instant message. The term phishing arises from the use of increasingly sophisticated lures to “fish” for users’ financial information and passwords. (Click on the Wikipedia link at the beginning of this paragraph for more information including detailed examples claiming to come from eBay or PayPal). I’ve recently come across a new Phishing scheme that causes a window to pop-up on a computer claiming to be from AOL, and requesting information you should never give out on the internet – such as ATM PIN number. Luckily the customer did the right thing by not filling out the form, called AOL and confirmed that this is a phishing scheme. You can see the official-looking window below.