New iPhone OS 3.1 anti-phishing feature in action

The  iPhone OS 3.1 update which Apple recently released includes a new anti-phising feature that alerts you when you visit fraudulent websites. To those who don’t know what phishing is, it’s basically websites disguised as other sites and steal your login information once you type it in. For example, you might click on a link in your e-mail that looks exactly like PayPal.com, but it’s actually PayPal352352353.com and the person who set it up wants to steal your login. The iPhone 3.1 anti-phishing feature notifies you when you come across a website like this.

By default the anti-phishing feature is turned on in iPhone OS 3.1. If you’re not sure whether or not it’s on, go to Settings -> Safari and slide the “Fraud Warning” button to ON.

Here is what it should look like:

I decided to test this anti-phishing feature on multiple websites. Safari was able to detect and give me a warning each time my iPod Touch visited a phishing website. This new feature of Safari is really effective. I feel safer browsing webites on my iPod Touch now. You can see the anti-phishing message  in action on the top of this post.