Castlecops have released their August ranking for the top 30 most phished sites. According to the report, eBay and PayPal are in a league of their own.
1 PayPal => 147
2 eBay => 118
3 Bank of America => 37
4 Fifth Third Bank => 25
5 Wachovia => 24
The question is whether these two (one company, really) are targeted because of the value of assets or because of the vulnerability of their system, which could include the manner in which they communicate with their users about the threats.
In an article from February of 2006, Police in Lawrence, Kansas were said to have issued a warning about fake coupons:
In general, the fake coupons offer large discounts or a free item with no required purchase.
Hmmm, like the Starbucks coupon? In this case, again, the retailers have a hard time knowing whether the coupons are legitimately created by a manufacturer.
Employees at Checkers called police this week after they received an e-mail from one of their saleswomen warning of the scam. They checked their records and found that three of the coupons had been recently accepted, Smith said — two of them by the same woman who came to the store twice and each time used a coupon offering $5 off a bottle of Advil.
So and Advil coupon is very different than a Checker’s coupon being redeemed at Checkers, from a security perspective, but it nonetheless highlights the changing landscape for retailers.
The championship has started and it looks like US (and world) favorite Pete Melvin was forced to retire early on the first day from a collision. More details available here.
Richard Branson is diving into the Ethanol market by promising $400 million in investments for alternative energy, according to Bloomberg. Let’s hope he also supports biodiesel and hybrid/electric technology for vehicles, but so far it looks like just more of the same Ethanol hype:
Cilion, which was formed in 2006, builds and runs factories producing ethanol, an alcohol derived from plants. The company plans to build as many as seven plants with capacity to produce as much as 440 million gallons a day of ethanol by 2009. The first three units will be built in California, Branson said.
Branson plans to expand the investment program, which will also target other forms of alternative energy, into the U.K., Europe and other parts of the world, he said.