Barracuda Networks Reports Thanksgiving Day Phishing Surge as Scammers Rush to Cash in on ‘Black Friday’

Thousands of New Phishing Web Sites Appear in 24-hour Period as Scammers Work Overtime to Take Advantage of Four-Day U.S. Holiday Weekend

CAMPBELL, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Barracuda Networks, Inc., the worldwide leader in email and Web security appliances, reported a more than 10x surge in the number of phishing Web sites created and three times the number of phishing emails sent out in the last 24 hours. This increase in activity indicates that scammers and their criminal networks are working feverishly to cash in on ‘Black Friday,’ traditionally the biggest shopping day of the year, and the long Thanksgiving Day weekend.

“Anyone planning to do holiday shopping online this weekend should go directly to the sites that they plan to purchase from, rather than click on URLs that arrive via emails.”

Barracuda Central, a 24/7 security operations center at Barracuda Networks that continuously monitors the latest spam, virus and other Internet threats, including phishing Web sites, observed a tremendous increase in the number of fake Web sites targeting popular shopping sites, including eBay, Amazon, PayPal, and other e-commerce sites, pop up on Thanksgiving Day. Typically phishing Web sites are set up via compromised PCs of innocent businesses and are quickly shut down once the business has been notified. However, by exploiting the four-day Thanksgiving weekend in which most U.S. business activity shuts down on Thursday and Friday, scammers are banking on the idea that the sites will go uninterrupted because no one is available to take them offline.

“Consumers need to be extra vigilant when shopping online this weekend,” said Dean Drako, president and CEO of Barracuda Networks. “Anyone planning to do holiday shopping online this weekend should go directly to the sites that they plan to purchase from, rather than click on URLs that arrive via emails.”

The Thanksgiving surge in phishing Web sites has also created an increase in emails directing unsuspecting users to the sites directly by offering ‘great deals’ or ‘sales’ as well as emails that attempt to lure the recipient into verifying account information via a link to the fake sites.

“We typically see an increase in phishing activity before a regular two-day weekend, but the volume of phishing sites and corresponding email in just this past 24 hours is quite astounding,” said Drako. “We expect this blitz to continue over the next few days.”

Barracuda Networks is working around the clock this weekend to ensure that its more than 50,000 customers worldwide are protected from this phishing attack. For more information on this weekend’s phishing activity, please visit Barracuda Central at www.barracudacentral.com.

About Barracuda Networks, Inc.

Barracuda Networks, Inc., is the worldwide leader in email and Web security appliances. Barracuda Networks also provides world-class IM protection, application server load balancing and message archiving appliances. More than 50,000 companies, including Coca-Cola, FedEx, Harvard University, IBM, L'Oreal, NASA and Europcar, are protecting their networks with Barracuda Networks solutions. Barracuda Networks' success is due to its ability to deliver easy to use, comprehensive solutions that solve the most serious issues facing customer networks without unnecessary add-ons, maintenance, lengthy installations or per user license fees. Barracuda Networks is privately held with its headquarters in Campbell, Calif. Barracuda Networks has offices in eight international locations and distributors in more than 80 countries worldwide. For more information, please visit www.barracuda.com.