This week some Biodata IT staff received a "special announcement" e-mail from Citibank saying:
"Recently there have been a large number of identity theft attempts targeting Citibank customers..." If you have also received this e-mail luring you to a secure https site to confirm your bank account details, you have become a target or even a victim of a so-called phishing scam.
Phishing or brand spoofing uses e-mail messages pretending to come from legitimate businesses such as Citibank, eBay or Internet service providers. The messages look authentic with corporate logos and formats similar to the ones used for legitimate messages. They ask to access a secure https site for verification of certain confidential information, such as account numbers and passwords. Since these e-mails look very official, many of the unsuspecting recipients respond to them, resulting in financial losses, identity theft and other fraudulent activity against them.
To provide the local market with a solution to this problem, Biodata IT South Africa has partnered with Microdasys Inc, a leading provider of specialised content security solutions, such as the inspection and control of encrypted Internet connections and the content inspection with headquarters in Las Vegas.
"We are excited about this partnership because there definitely is an increasing need and subsequently a potential for their SCIP product in terms of extending market reach and creating awareness around threats that continue to plague Internet security," explains Chris Runte, a director of Biodata IT South Africa who countersigned the agreement.
Microdasys SCIP allows you to benefit from the advantages of sending and receiving encrypted Web traffic safely by installing an inspection point that allows your security software to inspect and apply security policies to these previously overlooked packets, such as encrypted Web pages, Web-based e-mail, instant messaging, chat content and games.
In addition, SCIP catches bogus, self-signed and revoked certificates, a common indicator of unauthorised encrypted traffic. Certificates are checked based on the policies you set and up-to-date revocation lists every time a connection is made. The process only affects encrypted traffic and is so fast that it is usually invisible to the user.
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Biodata IT South Africa (Pty) Ltd is a distributor of IT security products and ISDN/ADSL solutions. The company`s portfolio includes desktop and content security, e-mail and ISDN line encryption, firewall/VPN products.
Biodata`s concept and market approach is to provide products for the individual areas of IT security, including niche products such as phishing scam protection, VPN/SSL appliances and fingerprint authentication without smart card.
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