Microsoft will start more than 100 legal proceedings against alleged phishers in Africa, Europe, and the Middle East.

The Global Phishing Enforcement Initiative is designed to target international phishers, who are usually sending misleading URLs to users to try and get them to enter personal information such as bank account information, passwords and credit card details into a fake website.

Some of the most popular sites that are hurt by phishers are Paypal, MSN, Amazon and Ebay.

The campaign will target phishing groups that flood inboxes with unsolicited e-mails requesting bank account details, passwords, credit card details or other personal details that can be used for identity theft and fraud.

This news article was written on March 21, 2006, quoting Times Online.