Gone Phishing? Collaborative Site Roots Out E-Mail Scams
by Will Safer, posted Jun 22nd 2008 at 2:12PM
It's time to assemble your pole, bait the line and drop a hook into the wild waters of the Internet. Yes, Switched fans, we're looking to get the catch of the day, PhishTank style.
The folks at PhishTank, part of OpenDNS, have tapped the social-linking-collaborative environment of Web 2.0 to assemble what could be the master list of all phishing scams out there on the Web today.
A phishing scam is an attempt by some ne'er-do-well to to steal your personal information, usually with an e-mail entreaty to start. These e-mail messages look like they come from a reputable and trusted source, like a bank or eBay, but they ask for lots of important personal information, such as a credit card number, Social Security number, account number or password. It may seem like common sense to ignore such a request by e-mail, but plenty of people -- perhaps in a rush to be cooperative -- give away all these details, and then it's open season on their accounts by the criminals.
it's an open secret that one of the downsides to the the ubiquity of 
Oh Cranky Pants, will you ever run out of things to be bitter about. John Dvorak is quickly becoming tech journalism's old man on the porch... with a shot gun. With columns such as '
