Google Adwords Advertisers Targeted By Phishing Cyber Criminals From China
- By Grey McKenzie
- Published 07/25/2008
Grey McKenzie
National Cyber Security Founder
Cyber security watchdog Grey McKenzie is one of the nation's leading Internet security experts.
Some of his clients include members of the Department of Homeland Security, State Department, Department of Defense & the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
His SpyCop security software products are in use by over 50,000 individuals & companies worldwide
To schedule an interview or consult with Grey call 902-532-2262
Dear Advertiser,
We were unable to process your payment.
Your ads will be suspended soon unless we can process your payment.
To prevent your ads from being suspended, please update your payment information.
Please sign in to your account at http://adwords.google.com/select/login, and update your payment information.
We look forward to providing you with the most effective advertising available.
Thank you for advertising with Google AdWords.
The Google AdWords Team
The above email was sent to my email account and yes I do use Google AdWords for certain projects I'm involved with.
It looks very realistic and my first thought was... Oh no my campaigns are offline & I'm losing money !
Panic can cause many of us to do things we normally wouldn't do, like click on the link in the email which actually looked sort of like it came from Google...
http://www.adwords.google.com.aqijd.cn/select/Login
But on closer inspection it is obviously going to a website in China.
No doubt if anyone does go to this website it will look like a Google AdWords page.
What was the goal of this email?
They wanted me to update my payment information.
This would require me to enter credit card details that would then allow them to use my credit card number, steal my identity and spend my money.
What many people don't know is that I probably wouldn't lose any money, because when a stolen credit card is used to purchase goods or services, the merchant whose goods or services that were purchased usually has to bite the bullet if they want to keep their merchant account active.
The main point here is NEVER click on a link in an email that your aren't absolutely sure where it came from or who sent it.
We were unable to process your payment.
Your ads will be suspended soon unless we can process your payment.
To prevent your ads from being suspended, please update your payment information.
Please sign in to your account at http://adwords.google.com/select/login, and update your payment information.
We look forward to providing you with the most effective advertising available.
Thank you for advertising with Google AdWords.
The Google AdWords Team
The above email was sent to my email account and yes I do use Google AdWords for certain projects I'm involved with.
It looks very realistic and my first thought was... Oh no my campaigns are offline & I'm losing money !
Panic can cause many of us to do things we normally wouldn't do, like click on the link in the email which actually looked sort of like it came from Google...
http://www.adwords.google.com.aqijd.cn/select/Login
But on closer inspection it is obviously going to a website in China.
No doubt if anyone does go to this website it will look like a Google AdWords page.
What was the goal of this email?
They wanted me to update my payment information.
This would require me to enter credit card details that would then allow them to use my credit card number, steal my identity and spend my money.
What many people don't know is that I probably wouldn't lose any money, because when a stolen credit card is used to purchase goods or services, the merchant whose goods or services that were purchased usually has to bite the bullet if they want to keep their merchant account active.
The main point here is NEVER click on a link in an email that your aren't absolutely sure where it came from or who sent it.
