Most of us have heard about phishing; we know that phishing is a bad thing, and that people behind the so called phishing attacks have different evil goals. But what is phishing in fact? What are the real dangers of the phishing attacks? And furthermore how can we protect our personal computers against this phenomenon that seems to be more and more en vogue?

So, because everybody has heard about phishing, but just a few of us really know what this means and involves, a team of scientists from the Carnegie Mellon University have wanted to answer all these questions and many others. And they have not just wanted to find all the correct answers for most of the possible answers, but they have also chosen a very interesting way of doing this. The scientists have developed an online game that will be in fact a tool that will teach the Internet users about the dangers of phishing.

And because phishing is a serious issue on the Internet, the scientists seem to have wanted to add also a drop of humor in the context: the game features a cartoon fish called Phil. This is why the innovative game is also called Anti-Phishing Phil.

The game has been already tested in CMU’s Privacy and Security Laboratory and the scientists have noticed that the users who spent no more than 15 minutes playing the game have been able to better discern the fraudulent web sites than the users who have simply read some tutorials about phishing.

The educative online game makes part of a larger CMU anti-phishing research initiative that is funded by the Army Research Office and the National Science Foundation.