Gartner notes that 2.4 million consumers have reported losing money directly due to phishing attacks in the year to May 2005; of those consumers, half of them lost a combined $929 million in the 12 months preceding the survey.
(2.4 million suckers divided by 525,600 minutes/year gives 4.566. The loss per user is impressive, at almost $1,000, though I don't know why Gartner only gives numbers for half of them... I'd guess that gives a more impressive number.)
Phishing solicitations increased 28% from 57 million during the 12-month period ended in April 2004 to 73 million for the year ended May 2005. This is a smaller number than I would've guessed, given the prominence this topic gets. I suspect that the number of people losing money has increased more rapidly, though the press stories on the Gartner report don't mention this.
It's having an impact: according to Gartner, 33% of online shoppers are buying fewer items due to concerns about online fraud, and 75% are more cautious about where they shop online. The scary implication is the 25% are not more cautious about where they shop online...
Sources: Internet Retailer, ZDNet's IT Facts
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