In brief, a 'phishing' email is one that pretends to be from a company or bank like eBay, PayPal, WAMU, Suntrust etc, and which asks you, (for various reasons), to enter your account data, such as login details. These scams are often supported by fake spoof websites, and victims are tricked into thinking they are logging to a real website. Phishing is a form of identity theft, where fraudsters steal your identity and personal information to gain access to your accounts or commit other crimes using your persona. (from MillerSmiles.co.uk):

A current list of phishing attempts is available at the main Virus page beneath the fraudulent e-mail section.

Update on November 15, 2004 -

The Office of Information Technology would like you to be aware that there is currently a lottery e-mail hoax being spread to ISU's Community that urges recipients to contact people who may attempt to defraud you. A example of this hoax is available here.

Update on August 11, 2004 -

The Office of Information Technology would like you to be aware that there is currently another round of attempts to defraud people using legitimate looking e-mail from Banks. These can include subjects like "Verify your data with U S Bank" (the bank name will vary), "CitiBank: Urgent Security Notification For Client Of The Bank" and "Critical Changes to Your Account Access".

Posted 10/02/02 -

The OIT Help Desk continues to receive forwarded copies and inquiries about emails involving confidence schemes (scams) intended to defraud the recipients.

Please beware of any emails promising opportunities to make money. Any email that requests personal information such as a bank account numbers, passwords, credit card numbers, etc should be ignored. If you are concerned about the validity of an email, please forward it to the OIT Help Desk. Contact us: http://ithelp.indstate.edu/contact.html. Please do not forward these messages to others.

An example of a very common email scam is the Nigerian Scam. This email urges you to assist in transferring money from a foreign country. The names and countries involved can vary. Information regarding this scam is located here:
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/alerts/nigeralrt.htm

For more information on email scams and hoaxes, see the following pages:
http://ithelp.indstate.edu/virus/
http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org

Please call the OIT Help Desk if you need assistance, we are available at ext. 2910 or via web form: http://ithelp.indstate.edu/get-help-online.html