Phishing can be extremely detrimental to a company's reputation, a fact that was illustrated by a recent nationwide survey of the UK populace. Around 50% of the 2,000 respondents to the survey said that they thought less of a company if they received a phishing email claiming to be the company's representative.
Earlier research of the practice showed that consumers are highly concerned that they could fall victim to a phishing scam, but "well-known brands are also suffering, and phishing attacks are having a detrimental effect on their reputation. This knock-on effect will be particularly worrying for the banks, which rely on a high degree of trust with their customers," said Neil Cook, UK technology chief at email security firm Cloudmark, which commissioned the survey.
Banks are the hardest hit of phishing scams: over 40% of respondents said that had they received a phishing email from their banks it would certainly put them off. Nearly the same percent said the same about ISPs, 36% about online shopping sites and 33% about online communities.
Most businesses, however, tend to blame it on the ISPs for not filtering messages well enough.
Earlier research of the practice showed that consumers are highly concerned that they could fall victim to a phishing scam, but "well-known brands are also suffering, and phishing attacks are having a detrimental effect on their reputation. This knock-on effect will be particularly worrying for the banks, which rely on a high degree of trust with their customers," said Neil Cook, UK technology chief at email security firm Cloudmark, which commissioned the survey.
Banks are the hardest hit of phishing scams: over 40% of respondents said that had they received a phishing email from their banks it would certainly put them off. Nearly the same percent said the same about ISPs, 36% about online shopping sites and 33% about online communities.
Most businesses, however, tend to blame it on the ISPs for not filtering messages well enough.
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