CSCD 303Essential Computer SecurityWinter 2014
Lecture 3 - Social Engineering1PhishingReading: See links at end of lecture
Overview
• Social Engineering–Defined
• Humans as vulnerabilities• Phishing –What is it?–What does it accomplish–How to recognize it?–Solutions to Phishing
Social Engineering
Social Engineering Manipulating or tricking people into divulging private information as opposed to using technical hacking techniques
Or, getting them to use unauthorized devices to compromise themselves
Test Case of Human Vulnerabilities June 2011, Bloomberg published the
results of a test conducted by the U.S. Depart. of Homeland Security
To assess the government’s vulnerability to unauthorized system access,
DHS dropped disks and USB drives in parking lots of government agencies and private contractors
Test Case of Human Vulnerabilities Results
60 % of workers who found devices plugged them into their office computers
When device was imprinted with an official number of installations on office machines skyrocketed to 90 %
http://www.crn.com/blogs-op-ed/channel-voices/232200743/how-to-manage-the-weak-link-in-cybersecurity-humans.htm
The Individual User
Users…• Represent the largest install base• Completely lack standards• Cannot be controlled centrally (or
otherwise)• Are only predictable in their
unpredictability• Cannot be redesigned• Are all of us !!!
What Exactly is Phishing?
Define Phishing
Phishing Scams Defined
• Phishing is type of deception designed to steal your personal data, such as credit card numbers, passwords, account data, or other information
• Con artists might send millions of fraudulent e-mail messages that appear to come from Web sites you trust
•Like your bank or credit card company, and request that you provide personal information.
More Phishing Definitions
Spear Phishing – a phishing scam that targets a specific audience
Example with Kansas Statue Univ. but mentions Kansas State University and is sent to K-State email addresses
Scareware - Tries to trick you into responding by using shock, anxiety or threats
“reply with your password now or we’ll shut down your email account tomorrow”
Socially aware attacks Mine social relationships from public data Phishing email appears to arrive from someone known to
victim Use spoofed identity of trusted organization to gain trust Urge victims to update or validate their account Threaten to terminate the account if the victims not reply Use gift or bonus as a bait Security promises
Context-aware attacks “Your bid on eBay has won!” “The books on your Amazon wish list are on sale!”
Spear-Phishing: Improved Target Selection
General Patton is retiring next week, click here to say whether you can attend his retirement party
Phishing Increasing in SophisticationTargeting Your Organization
Spear-phishing targets specific groups or individuals
Type 1 – Uses info about your organization
Phishing Increasing in SophisticationTargeting Your Organization
Around 40% of people in experiments at CMU would fall for emails like this (control condition)
Phishing Increasing in SophisticationTargeting You Specifically
Type 2 – Uses info specifically about you
Social Phishing• Might use information from social networking
sites, corporate directories, or publicly available data
• Ex. Fake email from friends or co-workers• Ex. Fake videos of you and your friends
Phishing Increasing in SophisticationTargeting You Specifically
Here’s a video I took of yourposter presentation.
Another Example:
But wait…
WHOIS 210.104.211.21:
Location: Korea, Republic Of
Even bigger problem:
I don’t have an account with US Bank!
Images from Anti-Phishing Working Group’s Phishing Archive
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Spear PhishingExampleKSU.edu
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Spear PhishingExampleKSU.edu
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ScarewareExample
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ScarewareExample
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Another Scareware Example
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Another Scareware Example
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Spear phishing scam received by K-Staters,January 2010If you clicked on the link…
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Malicious link in scam email took you to an exact replica of K-State’s single sign-on web page, hosted on a server in the Netherlands,that steals ID and password if they enter it and click “Sign in”Clicking on “Sign in” then took user to K-State’s home pageNote the URL – flushandfloose.nl, which is obviously not k-state.edu
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Real SSOweb page
Fake SSOweb page
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Real SSOweb page –note “https”
Fake SSOweb page –site not secure (http,not https) andhosted in theNetherlands(.nl)
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Real SSOweb page –Use the eIDverificationbadge tovalidate
Fake SSOweb page
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Result of clicking on eID verification badge on the fake SSO web site, or any site that is not authorized to use the eID and password
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Result of clicking on eID verification badge on a legitimate K-State web site that is authorized to use the eID and password for authentication
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Real K-State Federal Credit Unionweb site
Fake K-State Federal Credit Union web site used in spear phishing scam
Phreaking + Fishing = Phishing- Phreaking = making phone calls for free back in 70’s- Fishing = Use bait to lure the target
Phishing in 1995Target: AOL usersPurpose: getting account passwords for free timeThreat level: lowTechniques: Similar names ( www.ao1.com for www.aol.com ), social engineering
Phishing in 2001Target: Ebayers and major banksPurpose: getting credit card numbers, accountsThreat level: mediumTechniques: Same in 1995, keylogger
Phishing in 2007Target: Paypal, banks, ebayPurpose: bank accountsThreat level: highTechniques: browser vulnerabilities, link obfuscation
History of Phishing
• 2,000,000 emails are sent• 5% get to the end user – 100,000 (APWG)• 5% click on the phishing link – 5,000 (APWG)• 2% enter data into the phishing site –100 (Gartner)• $1,200 from each person who enters data (FTC)• Potential reward: $120,000
A bad day phishin’, beats a good day workin’
In 2005 David Levi made over $360,000 from 160 people using an eBay Phishing scam
Anti-phishing Working Group
http://www.antiphishing.org/
How Bad Is Phishing?Consumer Perspective Estimated ~0.5% of Internet users per year fall for phishing attacks Conservative $1B+ direct losses a year to consumers Bank accounts, credit card fraud Doesn’t include time wasted on recovery of funds, restoring computers, emotional uncertainty Growth rate of phishing 30k+ reported unique emails / month 45k+ reported unique sites / month Social networking sites now major targets
How Bad Is Phishing?Perspective of Corporations
Direct damage Loss of sensitive customer data
How Bad Is Phishing?Perspective of Corporations
Direct damage Loss of sensitive customer data Loss of intellectual property
Why Do People Fall for Phishing? Phishing has been around for years How come people still fall for it?
Research on PhishingCarnegie Mellon University Interviewed 40 Internet users
including 35 non-experts Conducted Mental models interviews
Mental models included email role play and open ended questions
Reference: J Downs, M. Holbrook, and L. CranorDecision Strategies and Susceptibility to Phishing.In Proc. of the 2006 Symposium On Usable Privacy and
Security
Research on PhishingCarnegie Mellon University
Only 50% knew the meaning of the term Phishing
85% were aware of the lock icon Only 40% knew it was supposed to be there Only 35% had noticed the https and knew
what it means Only 55% noticed an unexpected or strange
URL Only 55% reported being cautious when asked
for sensitive financial info Few reported being suspicious of being asked for
passwords … was in 2006 Do you think there would be the same stats
today?
Research on PhishingCarnegie Mellon University Naïve Evaluation Strategies
Most strategies didn't help people in identifying phishing
“ This email appears to be for me”“ It's normal to hear from companies you
do business with”“ Reputable companies will send emails”
Knowledge of some scams didn't help identify other scams
Determining Email Fraud and Protection Measures
Today's SolutionsNot so Successful Anti-phishing filters that rely on
blacklists and whitelistsUsually not up to date and there are
many false positives Training
Websites and posters help some Spam Filters
Don't tend to catch phishing, emails look legitimate
More Successful Solutions
Two Research Based Filters, CMU Pilfer Cantina
Pilfer – Looks at other features than email textNumber of domains linked to emailLinks in email to other than the main domain
Cantina – Use Content based approachCreates a fingerprint of a web pageSends fingerprint to search engineSees if web page is in search results
• If yes, then legitimate
Detecting Phishing Web SitesIndustry uses blacklists to label phishing sites But blacklists slow to new attacksIdea: Use search engines Scammers often directly copy web pages But fake pages should have low PageRank on search engines Generate text-based “fingerprint” of web page keywords and send to a search engine
Y. Zhang, S. Egelman, L. Cranor, and J. Hong Phinding Phish: Evaluating Anti-Phishing Tools. In NDSS 2007.
Y. Zhang, J. Hong, and L. Cranor. CANTINA: A content-based approach to detecting phishing web sites. In WWW 2007.
G. Xiang and J. Hong. A Hybrid Phish Detection Approach by Identity Discovery and Keywords Retrieval. In WWW 2009.
Human Training
Following slides provide common advice for identifying phishing or fraudulent emails ...
Look at few phrases to look for if you think an e-mail message is phishing scam
• "Verify your account" Businesses should not ask you to send passwords, login names, Social Security numbers, or other personal information through e-mail
– If you receive an e-mail from anyone asking you to update your credit card information, do not respond:
– This is a phishing scam
• "If you don't respond within 48 hours, your account will be closed."These messages convey a sense of urgency so that you'll respond immediately without thinking
Human TrainingHow To Tell If An E-mailMessage is Fraudulent
Human TrainingHow To Tell If An E-mailMessage is Fraudulent
"Dear Valued Customer." Phishing e-mail messages are usually sent out in bulk and often do not contain your first or last name
"Click the link below to gain access to your account."• HTML-formatted messages can contain links or forms that you can fill out just as you'd fill out a form on a Web site• The links that you are urged to click may contain all or part of a real company's name and are usually "masked," meaning that the link you see does not take you to that address but somewhere different, usually a phony Web site.• Resting mouse pointer on link reveals the real Web address• String of cryptic numbers looks nothing like the company's Web address, which is a suspicious sign.
Con artists also use Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) that resemble the name of a well-known company but are slightly altered by adding, omitting, or transposing letters.
For example, the URL "www.microsoft.com" could appear instead as:
www.micosoft.com www.mircosoft.com www.verify-microsoft.com
Human TrainingHow To Tell If An E-mailMessage is Fraudulent
• Never respond to an email asking for personal information • Always check the site to see if it is secure. Call the phone number if necessary• Never click on the link on the email. Retype the address in a new window• Keep your browser updated• Keep antivirus definitions updated• Use a firewall
P.S: Always shred your home documents before discarding them.
Human TrainingHow To Tell If An E-mailMessage is Fraudulent
Human TrainingAnti-Phishing Games Ok, traditional training doesn't work but ..
People like to play gamesTeach using a game
Results have shown thatMore people willing to play game than read People are better at identifying phishing after
playing the game Best known is Anti-phishing Phil from CMU
http://cups.cs.cmu.edu/antiphishing_phil/
Anti-Phishing Phil
A micro-game to teach people not to fall for phish
PhishGuru about email, this game about web browser
Also based on learning science principles You will get to Try the game!
S. Sheng et al. Anti-Phishing Phil: The Design and Evaluation of a Game That Teaches People Not to Fall for Phish. In SOUPS 2007, Pittsburgh, PA, 2007.
Anti-Phishing Phil
Evaluation of PhishGuru Is embedded training effective? Study 1: Lab study, 30 participants Study 2: Lab study, 42 participants Study 3: Field trial at company, ~300 participants Study 4: Field trial at CMU, ~500 participants Studies showed significant decrease in falling for phish and ability to retain what they learned
P. Kumaraguru et al. Protecting People from Phishing: The Design and Evaluation of an Embedded Training Email System. CHI 2007.
P. Kumaraguru et al. Getting Users to Pay Attention to Anti-Phishing Education: Evaluation of Retention and Transfer. eCrime 2007.
Anti-Phishing Phil: Study
Novices showed most improvement in false negatives (calling phish legitimate)
Anti-Phishing Phil: Study 2
Improvement all around for false positives
Summary Wikipedia has a nice page on phishing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phishing Phishing is already a plague on the Internet
Seriously affects consumers, businesses, governments Criminals getting more sophisticated
End-users can be trained, but only if done right PhishGuru embedded training uses simulated phishing Anti-Phishing Phil and Anti-Phishing Phyllis micro-games
Phishing at HoaxSlayerhttp://www.hoax-slayer.com/phisher-scams.html
Nice set of fishing examples with explanationshttp://www.hoax-slayer.com/phishing-scam-articles.shtml
Can try PhishGuru, Phil, and Phyllis at: http:// www.wombatsecurity.com
The End
Next Time: Attackers– Lab this week is Phishing !!!– Book – No real reference in our book– See references on previous slide