Scammers are increasingly calling on behalf of the bank

In the last week of winter in Russia has increased dramaticallythe number of bank customer complaints about telephone fraud using phone number spoofing. The banking call centers claim that the number of customers who applied after February 18 has increased tenfold.

Criminals improve method every day.cheating. New ways include calling the call centers on behalf of the client using the substitution of his phone number. If the operators do not find a substitution, fraudsters will be able to get full information about the victim’s banking operations, account balances and other confidential data. In the future, this information can be used in the next stage of the scam.

As the most characteristic examplefraud with the use of technology of spoofing numbers shows the experience of Sberbank, which at the end of January experienced a similar attack. Bank customers were called from a telephone number that was identified as a bank telephone number. The victim was informed of an attempted unauthorized withdrawal.

Further, the scammers recommended blockinga valid card and transfer the balance to a special secure account. At the same time, the criminals had confidential passport data of the client and the history of its financial operations up to the account balances. For greater certainty, the chosen victim was sent an SMS on the bank’s name also from a replacement phone.

The Central Bank of the Russian Federation said that the bankmobile operators and police have the technical ability to curb such criminal activities. In the cyber security department of the Central Bank, it was noted that the fight against telephone fraudsters depends on the speed of information exchange between services.

Mobile operators “Tele2” and “MegaFon” are notresponded to a request for a number substitution problem. MTS said that such an operation in their network is technically impossible. A VimpelCom spokesman said that his company was blocking several thousand attempts to replace a number a day, but this is a common figure and there is no increase in fraudulent attempts.

The return of funds lost as a result of such fraud is impossible, since the client himself informs the criminals of confidential information, which violates the contract with the bank.

Source: interfax.ru