Cyber criminals are targeting popular online gaming Web sites by using phishing tactics to steal passwords and confidential information from unsuspecting gamers.
This was one of the key findings of the Kaspersky Lab May 2011 spam activity report.
According to the security giant, 4.67% of all phishing e-mails were intended to steal passwords from free online gaming Web site RuneScape. As a result, this platform made its debut as the third most-targeted Web site, ahead of World of Warcraft (WOW) - the most popular online game in the world.
Kaspersky states in its report: “It appears the phishers have been attracted by the growing popularity of free online games as a source of profit.
“Fraudsters have also taken an interest in the sale of advanced level characters. The question remains as to why phishers have lost interest in WOW. This is most likely the result of the Blizzard team and its efforts to protect their users.”
Kaspersky states the overall leader in its phishing rating remained the payment system PayPal, which saw a rise in the number of phishing e-mails at 23.28 percentage points up on the figure for April 2011.
Earlier this month, Japanese video game company Nintendo suffered a security breach by hackers from cyber attack group LulzSec. Nintendo acknowledged the breach, but ruled out leakage of customer information.
The attack came days after Nintendo's rival, Sony PlayStation, suffered a security data breach which leaked millions of customers' sensitive information. In addition, Microsoft revealed phishing attacks on its own Xbox Live online gaming service.
Also this month, Electronic Arts subsidiary Bioware released an e-mail to its subscriber list detailing a hack on its systems, where information such as user names, e-mail addresses, CD keys, birth dates and phone numbers were compromised. However, Bioware said it reset user passwords and warned gamers to be wary of phishing attacks.
Share