August 20, 2007 10:25 AM PDT
Security Bites Podcast: Defeating online banking security
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CNET's Robert Vamosi talks with an expert about phishing attacks on online banking services.
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This week, in a revised show format, CNET's Robert Vamosi talks about how phishing operators can defeat those new controls in online banking security.
He's talking about those little security images of a puppy dog or an ocean view that banks have started to use to confirm you're on their site and not another's, or the series of secret questions they sometimes ask you to answer before allowing access to your account. These controls were designed to stop thieves from accessing your online bank accounts, yet phishing continues.
Vamosi talks with an expert who explains why these controls are easy to bypass. Brendan O'Connor, an independent security researcher, gave a talk at this year's DefCon conference in Las Vegas on online banking security. He hacked his own bank account before a live audience to demonstrate how phishing operators can bypass these new authentication controls. That said, O'Connor doesn't think putting more guards at the door is the answer. He says financial institutions should do more to protect the individual assets once the thief is inside your account.
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