Hotmail, Yahoo targeted in phishing attack

oogle’s Gmail may not have been the lone target in a phishing attack earlier this week, as an online security firm noted similar attacks on Microsoft’s Hotmail and Yahoo’s Yahoo Mail, the Gmanews.tv reported.

Trend Micro said its researchers in Taiwan revealed a phishing attack exploiting a vulnerability in Hotmail, and an attempt to steal users’ cookies in Yahoo Mail.

“Google’s services haven’t been the only ones targeted. Trend Micro researchers in Taiwan revealed a phishing attack that exploited a vulnerability in Microsoft’s Hotmail service. In fact, rather than clicking a malicious link, even the simple act of previewing the malicious email message can compromise a user’s account. This phishing email pretended to be from the Facebook security team," it said in a blog post.

“While the attacks appear to have been separately conducted, these have some significant similarities," it added.

In the case of Yahoo Mail, Trend Micro said that while the attempt to steal cookies to gain access to user accounts appeared to fail, “it does signify that attackers are attempting to attack Yahoo! Mail users as well."

Also, it said the same email address that attempted to exploit Yahoo! Mail was used in targeted attacks featuring malicious Microsoft Excel spreadsheets in March.

“This demonstrates the diversity of exploits that are available to attackers," it said.

On the other hand, Trend Micro said these events show attackers are also attempting to exploit vulnerabilities in popular Webmail services “to compromise Webmail accounts, to monitor communications, and to gain information in order to stage future attacks."