Two versions of the same phishing kit scammed thousands of people
Two versions of the same phishing kit scammed thousands of people
This phishing kit has been used to scam people across the globe, it has been reported. People in France and Israel were targeted the most, by two separate criminal gangs, but this issue is not isolated to those two countries. At least one of those gangs is believed to be affiliated with the OpIsrael political hacking group. Now, some of you may wonder what is a phishing kit. Well, it’s basically a piece of software that enables people to launch a phishing campaign. It doesn’t really require those people to be tech savvy in order to do it. Phishing, on the other hand, is essentially a scam in which one person (or a group of people) sends fraudulent emails or text messaging that appear legitimate. They usually represent a fake business or organization.
There are several different approaches to phishing
There are several different approaches to phishing
The entire point is to lure people into performing particular actions that will benefit the person who sent the email / text message. Such messages usually include a clickable payment link that requires you to enter your credit card info. If that’s not the case, then they may require you to provide Personally Identifiable Information (PII), or login credentials for specific accounts. They ask for this so they commit fraud, or do something similar. The third most often-used content of a phishing message is a clickable link with embedded malicious software, such as spyware, malware, or ransomware. A phishing kit makes performing such scams really simple.
Several different scams were in motion
Several different scams were in motion
vpnMentor notes that the first scam that they uncovered was using a phishing kit in order to represent someone as UPS Courier Service. People were receiving a text message claiming their package is ready for collection, and were redirected to a payment page to pay for the delivery. Needless to say, people who entered their credit card (and other) info, found themselves in a really tricky position. This scam was mostly performed in Israel, but people from the US, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, and Europe were also affected. 4,400 individuals managed to get tricked into paying, it seems. The second scam targeted customers of Crédit Agricole Bank in France. This scam has been in motion since October 2020. The scammers tried to mirror a website of the aforementioned bank. This campaign managed to scam around 1,700 people in France.
