Telecom Lead India: Indian enterprises
lost Rs 171.94 crore in 2011 due to phishing attacks, according
to RSA, a security division of EMC.
The findings by RSA suggest that India ranks in the top 5
most targeted countries for phishing attacks.
Furthermore, RSA established that in 2011 the total
number of losses was Rs 5760 crore globally.
Last year, approximately one in every 300 emails
circulating the web was deemed to contain elements pointing to phishing.
The number of phishing attacks increased 43 percent at
164,571 attacks during H2 2011, against 115,009 attacks in 1H
2011.
The findings revealed that most phishing content targeted
the public sector, which was followed by the SME business sector. A majority of
these were targeted phishing attacks aimed at leveraging known brands in fake
emails that attempt to fool email recipients.
In its October Fraud report, RSA had estimated that the
worldwide losses from phishing attacks alone amounted to over $520 million
during H1 2011.
The number of phishing attacks identified by RSA in
September increased by 45 percent, setting a new all-time high of 38,970
attacks. This increase was largely attributed to repeated attacks on a handful
of large financial institutions which have been heavily targeted throughout the
past few months.
