The Hindu Business Line : `Phishers'

It was interesting to read the short article on Internet `phishers' (Business Line, October 12). There is a site `e-gold', supposedly secure, which had been repeatedly handled in the way described in the article. The `phisher' is known to the bank (or financial handling agent e-gold) as he is one of its customers.

He sends you a mail, as if from e-gold, with all the trappings, including http:" address, saying a complaint has come in that someone has hacked your account.

Naturally, you respond to the mail. He has meanwhile set up keystroke copying software and, when you key in your pass-phrase, he gets all the details. When you access your account, only cents remain, while the dollars are in his account.

The hacked account has the name, account id of the hacker, time when the transfer took place, and so on. When you inform e-gold, they tell you that it has happened due to your carelessness of not verifying the genuineness of the mail as they do not send out any mails. They say that if the matter has to be pursued, the help of the local police must be sought, and the account-holder may be subpoenaed.

When I mailed e-gold, the reply was that they cannot retrieve the defrauded money but have placed a cap on the account of the scamster.

R. Narasimhan

Chennai

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