Fake shops are making a killing from counterfeit trainers
29th June, 2020
Online shopping has surged since lockdown started in March. Many of us, looking to be healthier, have headed online for sports equipment and a number of sportswear retailers have reported booming online sales. John Lewis recorded a 72% increase in total sports shoe sales, while Adidas and Puma have both seen an increase in ecommerce revenue.
Shoppers browsing online for the best deals, however, need to take care, as many people would be surprised at the scale of fake shops. Each day we find new fake shops designed to entice shoppers away from bona fide outlets, as many brands have yet to find effective countermeasures.
Counterfeit shoes, clothing and other accessories are estimated to lose the industry more than €26 billion each year in the EU alone, while the loss due to all online counterfeiting is estimated at $323 billion a year. The OECD estimated that over 3% of all imports worldwide are counterfeit.
Traditionally fake shops claim to sell luxury consumer goods at highly discounted prices. We have seen fake shops using at least three different models:
- Payment is accepted, but no goods are delivered.
- At the end of the checkout process, an error message is displayed such as “Out of Stock” and no transaction occurs. This is equivalent to a phishing attack, as the fake shop has the consumer’s credentials.
- Payment is accepted, and goods are delivered. The quality of goods varies between junk and identical to the bona fide item.
Trainers are the most counterfeited goods
We currently block around 75,000 fake shops in our extension and apps. Of these, roughly half target a specific brand, such as Nike or Adidas. About 70% of the fake shops selling branded goods sell shoes, predominantly trainers.
Corroborating this, European customs authorities handle more cases of counterfeit sports shoes than any other type of product.
Fake shops by type of goods sold
Netcraft wins 2020 Queen's Award for Enterprise
21st April, 2020
Netcraft has today received a Double Queen’s Award for Enterprise.
A Queen’s Award is the highest UK Government award for a British business. It is awarded on the Queen’s Birthday each year, and, in different times, it would include an invitation to a mass gathering at Buckingham Palace. The criteria set by our Government searches for considerable progress sustained over a six year period. This year, 128 companies received a Queen’s Award for International Trade and 66 companies a Queen’s Award for Innovation.
Netcraft is one of three companies to receive a Queen’s Award in both categories. The full list of winners is listed in the Queen’s Awards Press Book .
Netcraft Adds Coronavirus-related Cybercrime Protection to its Apps and Browser Extensions
10th April, 2020
Netcraft has added protection from Coronavirus-related cybercrime to its mobile apps for Android and iOS, and to its browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Opera, and Microsoft Edge. Websites containing these attacks will be blocked for those who have the app or extension installed. The iOS app — currently available in the UK and Canada — blocks Coronavirus-themed attacks impersonating Canadian and UK businesses as well as providing global coverage of fake shops purporting to sell Coronavirus-related goods.
Any Coronavirus-related cybercrime can easily be reported through the extension or app, by emailing scam@netcraft.com, or at report.netcraft.com, protecting other users from these attacks.
The Netcraft Browser Extension now blocks Coronavirus-related cybercrime
Since 16 March Netcraft has been monitoring and disrupting Coronavirus-themed cybercrime, which accounts for five percent of the attacks we perform countermeasures against and is becoming more prevalent on the internet.
The Netcraft App can be downloaded from any of the major three major app stores:
The Netcraft Extension can be downloaded for any of the four major browsers:
Netcraft Extension adds protection against malicious JavaScript
19th August, 2019
Netcraft has updated its browser extension to add protection against malicious JavaScript, including shopping site skimmers and web miners.
The Netcraft Extension now protects against malicious JavaScript
Shopping site skimmers are malicious JavaScript programs that steal your payment card information when you checkout on a compromised online store, and send it back to a fraudster to use later. These attacks have affected a large number of online shops, and are invisible to even the most vigilant shoppers as there is no visual change to the page.
Web miners are malicious JavaScript programs inserted by fraudsters into a website that let them steal your CPU power to mine for cryptocurrency using your browser without your consent. Browsing a website with a web miner can often slow down your computer by consuming its resources.
Netcraft proactively scans for new shopping site skimmers, web miners, and other malicious JavaScript on the web. In the past six months, we have found malicious JavaScript affecting over 70,000 sites on over 29,000 distinct IPs. We have identified these attacks on high-profile sites such as Cleor (a large French jewellery retailer), Misfit (a wearable devices brand), and Arctic (a PC components and accessories retailer), as well as on the personalized merchandise stores for dozens of sports clubs, including Southampton's and Swansea's.
A well-hidden shopping site skimmer
By using the Netcraft Extension you can get protection from these types of attack as soon as we detect them. It was first made available for Internet Explorer in 2004, Firefox in 2005, Chrome in 2012, Opera in 2013, and Microsoft Edge earlier this year.
Select your browser to download the Netcraft Extension now:
If you already have the Netcraft Extension installed your browser will update it automatically.
The Netcraft app for Android also provides protection against these attacks, while the Netcraft app for iOS provides protection against phishing attacks.
Netcraft releases anti-phishing extension for Microsoft Edge
16th July, 2019
The Netcraft Anti-Phishing Extension is now available for Microsoft Edge.
Netcraft anti-phishing extension on Microsoft Edge.
The Netcraft Anti-Phishing Extension provides phishing and XSS protection as well as informing you about the websites you visit. It was first made available for Internet Explorer in December 2004, followed by Firefox in 2005, Chrome in 2012 and Opera in 2013. Microsoft Edge is now supported with the arrival of the extension in the Windows Store. The extension is compatible with the current version of Microsoft Edge (34+) as well as the preview version available at Microsoft Edge Insider.
The extension displays a website's hosting provider, country, longevity and popularity, along with an abstracted risk rating for each site. Its key features are:
- Protection against phishing sites — the Netcraft anti-phishing community is effectively a giant neighbourhood watch scheme, empowering the most alert and most expert members to defend everyone within the community. As soon as the first recipients of a phishing mail report it, Netcraft blocks it for all users of the extension, providing an additional level of protection from phishing. Netcraft processes reports of fraudulent URLs from a variety of sources and proactively searches for new fraudulent sites.
- Detailed site reports — simply click the Netcraft logo to access a wealth of information about the sites you visit, helping you to make informed choices about their safety.
- Risk ratings — we evaluate the characteristics of the site compared against those depicted by fraudulent sites. The result is a simple visual summary displayed on the site report.
- Convenient reporting for suspected phishing & fraudulent sites — at the click of the button you can report suspected web forgeries to Netcraft, helping to protect the community. Netcraft operates an incentive scheme for phishing site submissions, including iPads, backpacks, mugs, and more. As of July 2019, over 65 million phishing sites have been detected and blocked by Netcraft since its anti-phishing service was launched.
- Protection against cross site scripting (XSS) — the extension optionally traps XSS and other suspicious URLs which contain characters highly likely to deceive.
Left: Microsoft Edge without the Extension - Right: The Netcraft Extension blocking page
The extension is now available to download from the Microsoft Store and once installed will automatically start blocking malicious sites. It is also available from the Google Chrome Store, Opera add-ons page and the Firefox add-ons page.
Netcraft has also released apps for iOS and Android, which protect your mobile device from phishing attacks.
Netcraft's Android app now available on the Amazon Appstore
31st January, 2019
Netcraft's new anti-phishing app, already available in the Google Play store, has just been released to the Amazon Appstore. The iOS app is with Apple for review.
Android web browsers lack comprehensive protection against malicious websites, and in most cases only block a small fraction of the sites blocked by their desktop counterparts. The Netcraft app solves this problem by extending our industry-leading phishing protection services to your mobile device. The app equips your Android device with Netcraft's continuously updated feed of phishing websites, and will alert you whenever you visit a site that's included in this blacklist.
The Netcraft app works with the most popular mobile web browsers on Android — including Amazon's Silk browser, Chrome, and Firefox — and other apps, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Slack.
The app's malicious site warning page in Amazon's Silk browser.
See our original post about the app for more information.
Download the app on Google Play or the Amazon Appstore now to protect yourself from phishing threats on your Android device. Subscribe to our mailing list to be among the first to hear when the Netcraft app for iOS is available, along with other news items from Netcraft.