Phishing

1. Phishing COEN 252 Computer Forensics Thomas Schwarz, S.J. 2006

2. URL Obscuring • Internet based criminal activity that subverts web technology: • Phishing (fraud) • Traffic redirection • Hosting of illegal sites • Child pornography

3. URL Obscuring • Internet based fraud is gaining quickly in importance. • Phishing: The practice of enticing victims with spoofed email to visit a fraudulent webpage. http://www.antiphishing.org/

4. URL Obscuring • Technical Subterfuge: • Plants crimeware onto PCs. • Example: Vulnerable web browser executes remote script at a criminal website. • Just staying away from porn no longer protects you. • Payload: • Use Trojan keylogger spyware. • Search for financial data and send it to an untraceable email address

5. URL Obscuring • Social Engineering: • Target receives e-mail pretending to be from an institution inviting to go to the institutions website. • Following the link leads to a spoofed website, which gathers data. • It is possible to establish a web-presence without any links: • Establish website with stolen / gift credit card. • Use email to send harvested information to an untraceable account, etc. • Connect through public networks.

6. URL Obscuring • Phishing • Targets general population • Thrives even with very low success rate • Spear Phishing • Targets individuals • More sophisticated and more expensive • Individual success has higher value

7. URL Obscuring: Phishing Example Visible Link: https://www.usa.visa.com/personal/secure_with_visa/index.html?t=h1_/index.html Actual Link: http://www.verified-web-us.com/Visa%20USA%20%20Personal%20%20Protect%20Your%20Card.htm Actual website IP: 209.35.123.41 Uses Java program to overwrite the visible address bar in the window:

8. URL Obscuring:Phishing Example

9. Phishing Tendencies • Phishs currently are very unsophisticated • Sophistication does not yield much better success rate

10. URL Obscuring • Phishs need to hide web-servers • URL Obscuring • Javascript or other active web-technology overwrites URL field • no longer possible in latest browsers • Other techniques to hide web-server address • Use hosts file • Hiding illegal web-server at legal site • Hijacking site to host pages.

11. URL Basics • Phishs can use obscure features of URL. • URL consists of three parts: • Service • Address of server • Location of resource. http://www.cse.scu.edu/~tschwarz/coen252_03/Lectures/URLObscuring.html

12. URL Basics • Scheme, colon double forward slash. • An optional user name and password. • The internet domain name • RCF1037 format • IP address as a set of four decimal digits. • Port number in decimal notation. (Optional) • Path + communication data. http://tschwarz:fiddlesticks@www.cse.scu.edu/~tschwarz/coen252_03/Lectures/URLObscuring.html http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=phishing

13. Obscuring URL Addresses • Embed URL in other documents • Use features in those documents to not show complete URL http://www.usfca.edu@www.cse.scu.edu/~tschwarz/coen252_03/index.html URL rules interpret this as a userid. Hide this portion of the URL.

14. Obscuring URL Addresses • Use the password field. • www.scu.edu has IP address 129.210.2.1. • Some browsers accept the decimal value 129*256**3 + 210*256**2 + 2*256 + 1 = 2178023937 for the IP address. • http://www.usfca.edu@2178023937 • Works as a link. • Does not work directly in later versions of IE

15. Obscuring URL Addresses • http://www.usfca.edu@129.210.2.1 works. • Hide the ASCI encoding of @: • http://www.usfca.edu%40129.210.2.1 • Or just break up the name: • http://www.usfca.edu%40%127%167w.scu.edu • Or use active page technologies (javascript, …) to create fake links.

16. Obscuring URL Addresses • IDN – International Domain Names • Non-english Unicode characters are encoded as basic ASCII strings: • punycode • punycode example • bűcher.ch encoded as xn- - bcher – kva.ch • Homographs: Characters from different alphabets look the same • Potential URL Obscuring • Register paypal.com, where one ‘a’ comes from a different alphabet.

17. Obscuring URL Addresses • Padding URLs • .. means go up • create directory … • http://129.210.2.1/.../../.../../.../../.../error.html

18. Obscuring URL Addresses • Redirection • Direct target redirects to main site • Chances of main site getting shut down is less • Technologies • Page-based redirection • Add meta tag to head section • <meta http-equiv=“refresh” content=“0; URL=http://bobadilla.engr.scu.edu”> • Server-based redirection • Apache: httpd.conf with a redirect statement • Redirection via vulnerable websites • 2006 eBay run a script that redirected based on query string to any site.

19. 'Enroll your card with Verified By Visa program' • 2004 Phish sends SPAM consisting of a single image:

20. 'Enroll your card with Verified By Visa program' • The whole text is a single image, linked to the correct citi URL. • If the mouse hovers over the image, it displays the correct citi URL. • But surrounded by an HTML box that leads to the phishing website.

21. 'Enroll your card with Verified By Visa program' • Target webpage has an address bar that is overwritten with a picture with a different URL. • Go to www.antiphishing.org .

24. Phishing • Phishers now use bogus https techniques. • Exploiting browser flaws to display secure icon. • Hacking legitimate sites or frames from these sites directly. • Purchase and present certificates for sites that are named in resemblance of the target sites. • The SSL lock icon is no longer a guarantee for a legitimate site.

25. Registrar Impersonation Phishing Attacks • Phisher sets up a bogus registrar customer portal • Phisher composes email correspondence from registrar • Phisher sends email to the contact email addresses for a domain name • Victims visit bogus registrar customer portal and disclose login credentials • Phisher collects account credentials for subsequent misuse

26. Registrar Impersonation Phishing Attacks • Domain name registration information is open to the public • E.g. whois for windows or linux/unix • Adversary can use this information (plus web) in order to target potential victims • For example, those whose registration is close to expiration • The information is also used to enhance the credibility of the message

27. Use whois

29. Registrar Impersonation Phishing Attacks • Once authentication information is obtained • Modify DNS records to point to name servers under attacker’s control • MX: Points to mail hosts under attacker’s control and use them to send spam, … • The victim was trusted • AAAA or A: To point to systems under attacker control • To host phony content • To provide false authentication portals

30. Registrar Impersonation Phishing Attacks • Fast Flux attacks • Fully qualified domain name has multiple (hundreds or even thousands) IP addresses assigned to it.

31. Registrar Impersonation Phishing Attacks • Counter measures taken: • Registrars limit open information severely • Should not use email to communicate with clients

32. Hiding Hosts • Name Look-Up: • OS checks HOST file first. • Can use HOST file to block out certain sites • adservers • Affects a single machine.

33. Subverting IP Look-Up • In general, not used for phishing. • Economic Damage • Hillary for Senate campaign attack. • Hiding illegal websites. (Kiddie Porn) • DNS Server Sabotage • IP Forwarding

34. Subverting IP Look-Up • Port Forwarding • URLs allow port numbers. • Legitimate business at default port number. • Illegitimate at an obscure port number. • Screen clicks • Embed small picture. • Single pixel. • Forward from picture to the illegitimate site. • Easily detected in HTML source code. • Password screens • Depending on access control, access to different sites.

35. Phisher-Finder • Carefully investigate the message to find the URL. • Do not expect this to be successful unless the phisher is low-tech. • Capture network traffic with Ethereal to find the actual URL / IP address. • Use Sam Spade or similar tools to collect data about the IP address.

36. Phisher-Finder • Capture network traffic with Ethereal when going to the site. • This could be dangerous. • Disable active webpages. • Do not use IE (too popular). • Look at the http messages actually transmitted. • Expect some cgi etc. script.

37. Phisher-Finder • Investigation now needs to find the person that has access to the website. • This is were you can expect to loose the trace. • The data entered can be transmitted in various forms, such as anonymous email. • For example, they can be sent to a free email account. • IPS usually has the IP data of the computer from which the account was set up and from which the account was recently accessed. • Perpetrator can use publicly available computers and / or unencrypted wireless access points. • Investigator is usually left with vague geographical data.