McAfee adds phishing protection to free SiteAdvisor product

Beginning immediately, consumers who download the free SiteAdvisor software will get advanced, real-time "phishing" detection that combines white lists, black lists and heuristics to provide early warnings against scam sites that can compromise consumers' identities. Currently, SiteAdvisor users will get this new feature automatically.

Phishing is an increasingly prevalent online scam in which a criminal uses spoofed e-mails and counterfeit Web sites to trick consumers into disclosing their financial and other personal information. This can lead to immediate financial loss and longer-term identity theft. According to the Anti-Phishing Working Group, unique phishing Web sites increased by 757% from October 2005 to October 2006, the most recent month for which data is available.

"Anti-phishing is a strong addition to SiteAdvisor's existing protections against adware, spyware, browser attacks, spam and other scams," said Patrick Hayati, Regional Director McAfee Middle East. "Anti-phishing protection gives McAfee SiteAdvisor users up-to-the minute protection against fraudulent spoof sites which is critical given the transient nature of most phishing attacks."

McAfee SiteAdvisor's pioneering safe search technology protects Internet users from adware, spam, viruses and other online scams. SiteAdvisor's software adds intuitive red, yellow, or green ratings to sites and search results based on proprietary tests of more than 95% of the trafficked Web. SiteAdvisor's ground breaking software has already been downloaded more than 10 million times and is available free of charge at www.mcafee.com.Consumers may use McAfee SiteAdvisor to complement their existing McAfee products, or with non-McAfee security products.