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As Adam said yesterday, they say you shouldn’t waste the crisis-and scammers keep that advice in mind.
Scammers use the coronavirus pandemic as a starting point for all kinds of financial fraud schemes. They are selling overpriced masks, fake charities, and misinformation. One of the enterprising scammers tried to sell the world’s tallest statue, a monument almost twice as tall as the Statue of Liberty in Gujarat, India. [Perhaps the Brooklyn Bridge was already off the market.]
Thankfully, an alliance of scammers is undertaking villains. One such initiative, the COVID-19 Cyber Threat Coalition, has more than 3,000 participants and is sponsored by companies such as the workplace messenger Slack, the code-sharing site Github, and the chip designer NVIDIA. . The partnership was launched last month by Sophos, a UK cybersecurity company acquired by Thoma Bravo, a Chicago-based private equity company for nearly $ 4 billion.
Mark Rogers, co-leader of another Coronavirus threat league I profiled last week, describes these different approaches as “like a different unit or battalion of the same army.” Their goal: defeat thieves.
Buddy tactics are evolving. Chester Whisney Ski, Sophos’s lead research scientist, says he was last remembered after a number of crisis-related scams following the effects of Hurricane Katrina. Wisniewski said at that time, scammers could use search engine optimization techniques to gather newly created malicious websites into Google’s prominent rankings to attract or deceive people searching for information online. was doing.
“It’s not impossible, but not much,” said Wisniewski, saying that Google has become much better in the 15 years since Katrina by excluding malicious sites. Today, he states that “all lures start almost from email.”
Wisniewski shared some of his team’s findings with Fortune. I have his list The 5 Most Common Email Scams It is still in circulation as of April 3.
Here’s the email subject and background on the message content: Don’t fall into them.
- “Do you feel helpless against Corona?” And “Forget the corona vaccine” And “Is Corona worse than Ebola?” These fraudulent emails open with the notice that “Gwenith [sic] Paltrow and Kate Hudson are both wearing self-portraits wearing masks N95.” The message further states that these masks do not protect people’s eyes from pathogens that cause sneezing. “What can you rely on? That’s it,” the author says, linking to a web page that sells products that appear to be protective eyewear.
- “Now mask that can prevent coronavirus” And “The coronavirus is spreading. You can control it with this special mask.” These emails promote a mask under the brand “OxyBreath Pro”. The message is misleading: “Here is a way to protect yourself from getting sick airborne disease.” Spam.
- “Corona is running away …” This email eventually asks people to pay to download fraudulent videos. “The most stupid thing you can do now depends on your government / large pharmaceutical company to protect you,” the message warns. “If the children do not want to be torn from you”-as wrongly claimed in Wuhan, China-“You must watch this emergency video.”
- “Three plants that need to be put into a shopping cart to fight the coronavirus” This email is intended to sell “naturopathic” books that can “fight against viruses, including the coronavirus.” The sender states, “I’m in a hurry to buy this book now,” and says, “If you can act quickly, you may still find a copy reserved under your name.” Yeah.
- “Top 10 Coronavirus Preparation Gears” “Are you ready to survive the pandemic?” That urges people to buy so-called “prepper gear”. “Emergencies must be on hand to be effective and safe,” said buyers.
Variations are skeptical if you encounter any of these scams or because they are bound to evolve. If in doubt, send it to your spam folder and have your friends and family watch over. [For a more comprehensive list of fraud, check out this helpful advice from the Federal Trade Commission.]
“These criminals are not striking the sand and will miss the opportunity to benefit from our fears,” says Wisniewski. “Sending your money to people taking advantage of this crisis will only make things worse.”
Robert Hackett
Twitter: @rhhackett
Email: [email protected]
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