Phishing is a one of the fastest-growing cybercrimes and costs consumers millions of dollars each year. Pronounced "fishing", is named from spammers using fraudulent email messages to "fish" for information in an attempt to get their recipients to divulging personal data like credit card numbers, bank account numbers, social security numbers, and passwords.

The rapidly growing class of identity theft scams on the internet has caused both short-term and long-term economic damage, faced by millions of people every day. First appearing more than ten years ago, phishing has grown to become the international electronic crime of choice for both amateurs and professionals alike.

Phishing is the fastest growing crime which everyone on the internet is susceptible to, an old con game taking advantage of new technology. It is so prevalent because it is such a low-cost and low-effort activity. Phishing attacks are likely to grow more sophisticated and our defenses against them must continue to improve to combat them.