Cloudmark Fights VoIP-Enabled Phishing

April 25, 2006

TMCnet writer Cindy Waxer reported on Cloudmark's efforts to fight an insidious new variation on the phishing scam that uses a hard-to-trace VoIP phone number and IVR system to collect personal information from victims (see "Phishing Attacks Cast Shadow over VoIP"). Patrick Barnard also wrote about the story and added some good comments from his interview with Cloudmark's senior research scientist Adam O'Donnell (see "Cloudmark Detects - and Thwarts - New VoIP Phishing Threat Discovered on its Network").

I've been using Cloudmark's Microsoft Outlook add-in toolbar for a few years now (get the free trial here), and I can't imagine going over to any other solution. The magic thing about Cloudmark is the way it mixes in the human element to identify and block spam quickly. The system is based on peer-to-peer networking technology, so that as a Cloudmark user you are actually part of a network of users who are collectively flagging and blocking spam on each other's behalf.

Here's an image showing the toolbar:

Cloudmark anti-spam anti-fraud toolbar

When a spam appears in your inbox, you select it and click the "Block Spam" button. The spam moves into your spam folder and your "vote" on that spam goes out to the collective network to help flag that message as spam for all other users. But frankly, most of the time you won't even see the spam messages, because many other users have already flagged them and they will go automatically into your spam folder without any action on your part.

For more about the Cloudmark toolbar, see my previous entry, "My Favorite Anti-Spam System."

AB -- 4/25/06