Phishing: Difference between revisions

Phishing scams first appeared during the 1990s on AOL. Emails that appeared to come from AOL but were actually from a hacker requested users to update their personal and financial information via email, causing many people to expose their information, which was abused by the hacker. The problem back then was that AOL permitted the creation of a fake account by means of a credit card generator, but after these attacks AOL had to change this technique. <ref>[http://www.allspammedup.com/2009/02/history-of-phishing/ Phishing history]</ref>

Phishing attacks expanded quickly with the use of PayPal and other such organizations and websites using online payments. These attacks motivated the creation of secure payment applications. The term "phishing" was coined in 1996, and hacked accounts were known as "phish".