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Kaspersky Lab: Spam and Phishing in 2017 Lists Bitcoin and FIFA 2018 as top new scams

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According to a report by software security company, Kaspersky Lab “Bitcoin” and “FIFA 2018” were the top spam and phishing topics used to scam online users in 2017.

The company’s “Spam and phishing in 2017” report revealed that cybercriminals have, over the past 12 months, been following the global agenda and used hot topics to steal money or personal information from people online.

“Spammers have shown themselves to be thoughtful actors, instantly monitoring global issues and major events around the globe with one main purpose – to capture and capitalise on their victim’s attention,” Kaspersky Lab said.

According to Kaspersky Lab’s discoveries, criminals have been using tricks such as websites disguised as cryptocurrency exchanges, fake services offering cloud mining, i.e. the use of specialised data centers for rent. But in all cases users became the victims – losing money instead of earning any. In more traditional fraud schemes, such as fake lottery winnings, criminals have also started to use Bitcoin as bait, and in addition to targeted address databases advertised through spam, databases with emails for cryptocurrency users have been also offered for purchase, promising great opportunities.

“In all cases users became the victims – losing money instead of earning any. In more traditional fraud schemes, such as fake lottery winnings, criminals have also started to use Bitcoin as bait, and in addition to targeted address databases advertised through spam, databases with emails for cryptocurrency users have been also offered for purchase, promising great opportunities,” the company said.

There was good news however, as Kaspersky Lab reported that the average amount of spam in 2017 decreased to 56.63%, which is 1.68 percentage points less than in 2016.

Other important trends and statistics in 2017, highlighted by Kaspersky Lab researchers, include the following:

  • The most popular source of spam was the USA (13.21%), followed by China (11.25%) and Vietnam (9.85%). Others in the top 10 include India, Germany, Russia, Brazil, France, and Italy.
  • The country most targeted by malicious mailshots was Germany (16.25%), showing a slight increase of 2.12 percentage points compared to 2016. Others in the top 10 include China, Russia, Japan, UK, Italy, Brazil, Vietnam, France, and UAE.
  • The largest percentage of users affected by phishing was in Brazil (29.02%). Overall, 15.9% unique users of Kaspersky Lab products worldwide were attacked by phishing.
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James Barnley

I’m the editor of the DomainingAfrica. I write about internet and social media, focusing mainly on Domains. As a subscriber to my newsletter, you’ll get a lot of information on Domain Issues, ICANN, new gtld’s, Mobile technology and social media.