Wii’s Phishing Vulnerability

Tech.co.uk has posted an article about Symantec’s report on the vulnerability of a phishing attack on a Nintendo Wii system.

Ollie Whitehouse of Symantec said that most gaming consoles are just as vulnerable to hacks, phishing attacks, and viruses compared to people who use their computer for browsing the internet.

“As we access the web on all these different devices, we inherit web problems such as phishing - those types of online attacks and potentially malicious code as well. These are definitely problems for the future which need to be addressed.”

He also said that, “In terms of how bad it could get, it’s conceivable at least in the short term that phishing attacks could become commonplace via a games console browser. The Wii lends itself very well to that.”

The article notes that the Wii does not have an anti-phishing toolbar. Therefore, those who use it can be phished easily.

My advice is that you should not do any searching on search engines when using the Wii because you may come across a fake site that looks like it is legit. Just use your computer when you want to research something so you will at least have some kind of protection.

One more thing - I think that it would be safer if you just buy Wii Points cards instead of using a credit card when you want to buy something from the Wii Shop Channel. I have not heard of any problems with this and I think this is good advice for everyone to follow.