Surprize, surprize: Phishing on the rise.

The FTC reports that both identity theft and Internet-related financial fraud is steeply rising, with formal complaints climbing from 161,896 in 2002 to 246,570 in the last year. Many of these attacks originate in countries in Eastern Europe and Africa, making it difficult for the authorities to find and prosecute the offenders. To help reduce this type of crime, the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC), an umbrella group of U.S. regulators that includes the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., recommended that banks increase their online security by 2006. >> Link

A Gartner survey of 5,000 U.S. adults showed that phishing attacks grew at double-digit rates last year in the United States. In the twelve months ending in May 2005, an estimated 73 million U.S. adults who use the Internet said they definitely, or think, they received an average of more than 50 phishing e-mails in the past year. 2.4 million online consumers report losing money directly because of the phishing attacks. >> Gartner Link