Doug Bedell — November 27, 2019, 9:54 am
Watch Out, Even, When You See .gov on the Web
Be wary, even, of a .gov domain name, Brian Krebs advises. “It’s way too easy to get a .gov domain name,” he writes.
“Earlier this month, KrebsOnSecurity received an email from a researcher who said he got a .gov domain simply by filling out and emailing an online form, grabbing some letterhead off the homepage of a small U.S. town that only has a “.us” domain name, and impersonating the town’s mayor in the application.
“I used a fake Google Voice number and fake Gmail address,” said the source, who asked to remain anonymous for this story but who said he did it mainly as a thought experiment. “The only thing that was real was the mayor’s name.”
For too many hackers, the Internet is like the funhouse at Coney Island, only with dire motives.