Katrina Scams Move Online

Spam and phishing scams try to capitalize on the Hurricane Katrina tragedy.

Hurricane Katrina has set off a wave of online phishing and other scams that try to capitalize on the emotional response of Americans to the disaster, security experts warned Friday.

The phishing efforts, fraudulent attempts to spoof sites to con users, include emails asking users to donate to victims of Hurricane Katrina by using fake news reports and heart-rending pictures. Money donated in this way does not go to any relief agency and is pocketed by spammers and con artists.

We are seeing attempts similar to those we saw after the recent tsunami in Asia where some people do not respect a tragedy and instead try to exploit it, said Scott Petry, vice president of products and engineering at Postini, an enterprise email security and management company.

Experts said that phishing attempts usually begin two to three days after a disaster, once public awareness about the event increases and there is widespread coverage of the incident.

This makes the timing for the current wave of Katrina-related spam and phishing just right, said Susan Larson, vice president of global threat analysis and research at SurfControl of Scotts Valley, California.

Just last night, President Bush brought the former Presidents Clinton and Bush on national television to start the relief campaign, said Ms. Larson. Once the money is flowing and the relief is legitimized, then the scams will prey on these sites, putting up spoofed ones and even trying to compromise the legitimate ones.

Spam and phishing attempts in the wake of the Katrina tragedy have increased the demand for Internet domain names that contain references to the disaster.

eBay currently lists a number of domain names related to Hurricane Katrina for sale with claims that proceeds will go for relief work. But Johannes Ullrich, chief research officer at Sans Institute, a computer security training and research company, said that more often than not it will be used by online con artists.

We have seen an increase in the number of sites registered with the URL relating to Hurricane Katrina in some way, said Mr. Ullrich. A vast majority of this has happened in the last few days.

Creative Crooks

Online scammers are coming up with some creative ways to dupe users. Sophos, a United Kingdom-based IT security company, has issued a warning about a spam campaign that poses as a news report about Hurricane Katrina. The email entices readers with a fake news story and then asks them to click onto a link to read more. The link takes them to a fake web site that tries to infect their PCs with malware.

Sophos says a typical example of this kind of email reads like this:

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said Tuesday that Hurricane Katrina killed as many as 80 people in his state, and burst levees in Louisiana flooded New Orleans.

Just before daybreak Tuesday, Katrina, now a tropical storm, was 35 miles northeast of Tupelo, Miss., moving north-northeast with winds of 50 mph. Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center said the amount of rainfall has been adjusted downward Monday.