The spear phishing attacks were announced by McAfee this week when one of the executives received a petition mail from the Tax Court. The scammers created a fairly believable mail using an address set up on ustaxcour.org domain (instead of ustaxcourt.gov). They also included in the mail an official telephone number, the name of the executive and a contact name from the Tax Court.
These are spear phishing attacks which means the scammers have spotted people susceptible of scam. They don't send millions of emails, but instead message only key people. The link included in the mail could contain scripts that install keyloggers on the system. Then they collect your data and you are scammed.
The U.S. Tax Court pested the following notice on its web site:
“The United States Tax Court has received many telephone calls regarding an e-mail which purports to originate from the Court being sent by a member of the Tax Court’s practitioner bar. This message is an example of “Spear Phishing,” which is an e-mail spoofing attempt that targets a specific organization. The Tax Court is not disseminating any e-mail notice to anyone who currently has a case before this Court.”
Beware! Don't open such emails unless you are sure about the sender.
via McAfee Blog
Comment Preview