According to a recent report from Halon, an email security provider, 94.7 percent of Americans received one or more emails that contained a virus, spyware or malware while nearly 9 percent opened an attachment infecting their computer or device. Read More

eBay Acquires Braintree to Bolster PayPal and Mobile Payments
In late September eBay announced their acquisition of Braintree, a payment service provider and gateway focusing on payments within mobile apps and websites. eBay is purchasing Braintree for $800 million in cash and the deal is expected to close before the end of 2013. Read More

SMiShing Scams Target U.S. Area Codes Utilizing Location-Specific Information
Phishing scams carried out via SMS text messages, known as SMiShing, continue to grow and target mobile users in the United States. Cloudmark, a messaging security software provider, recently cataloged the top 25 U.S. area codes that receive the most SMS spam and detailed various SMiShing scams targeting different regions. Read More

Fraudsters Used Spear Phishing Tactics to Initiate Attacks Against New York Times and Other Websites
In a high profile attack led by the Syrian Electronic Army against the New York Times and other websites, users accessing the affected sites were redirected to servers under the attackers’ control. Users were redirected to pages hosting malicious content, and this was all made possible following spear phishing attacks against an Australian web domain
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More Brands Targeted with Phishing Attacks so far in 2013
During the first six months of 2013 720 different brands were targeted by phishing attacks, an increase of 18 percent from the last six months of 2012, according the latest report from the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG). The two most targeted brands during the first half of 2013 were PayPal and Taobao.com. Read More

Avoiding Customer Service Chargebacks for your Online Business
Tips and techniques for avoiding preventable, customer service based chargebacks for small to mid-sized merchants are discussed in this guest post article from a Certified eCommerce Fraud Professional. Read More

Register for Online Training Programs Before October Price Adjustments
On October 1st The Fraud Practice will be increasing the enrollment prices of our online training programs across the board. If there are courses or Career Tracks that you’ve been considering for yourself or for staff, register by the end of September to enjoy the current low prices. Read More

Identity Fraud Against Payment Cards and Bank Accounts on the Rise in the UK
According to CIFAS, a fraud prevention membership association in the UK, both fraud involving payment cards and identity fraud increased in the first half of 2013 while 82 percent of identity fraud cases occurred online. Read More

Identity Fraud in the U.S. Increases for Second Consecutive Year
Identity fraud occurred every three seconds in the United States and led to $21 billion dollars in losses in 2012 according to Javelin Strategy & Research’s 2013 Identity Fraud Report. Read More

France, Russia and UK Lead Increase of Card Fraud in Europe
According to data from FICO and Euromonitor International, card fraud losses increased 6 percent in 2012 from 2011 while 80 percent of this increase came from Russia, France and the United Kingdom. Read More