Consumers must be aware of common scams as online transactions become the norm and personal banking details are protected by a slew of passwords and authentication processes.
Discovery Bank has urged its customers to be ‘cyber-safe’ during sales such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday, as well as the holiday season in general, citing the fact that criminals are out to steal money.
According to the South African Banking Risk Information Centre (SABRIC), the number of non-contact baking frauds in the country will decrease in 2021, but this is no reason to relax.
Sabric stated in its most recent annual report for 2021 that gross losses from banking-related fraud increased by 45%, from R310 million in 2020 to R440 million the following year, despite an 18% decrease in reported incidents since 2020, primarily due to a decrease in mobile banking fraud incidents.
Nowadays, criminals make the majority of their money by taking advantage of the fact that almost everyone banks online.
According to Sabric, online banking fraud accounts for the second-highest percentage of gross losses, despite accounting for a small proportion of all instances of digital crime. R33,781 was the average amount stolen from victims.
Discovery listed the following scams as the most prevalent in the country in a fraud alert issued by the bank:
- Phishing – when fraudsters send emails that appear to be from reputable businesses, like Discovery, and often promise a reward (such as a Black Friday refund) to get your personal information.
- Smishing – when criminals try to get your information by making you click a link in an SMS to a fake webpage.
- Qishing – a type of phishing that uses QR codes to scam victims. If you click a QR code, always check the website URL you’re directed to.
- MFA fatigue – Multifactor authentication (MFA) fatigue is a method criminals use to flood your authentication app with push notifications in the hope you’ll accept their false authentication, allowing them access to an account or device. Always check that you are authenticating the right push notification.
The latest scam circulating in the country, according to banking group FNB, is the remote access scam, which is used to gain access to online banking accounts.
“Remote access software is becoming a very popular way for fraudsters to gain access to your banking profile. These are sophisticated software programs that enable fraudsters to remotely take control of your PC over the internet,” FNB said.
Fraudsters call customers and offer to assist them in blocking a fraudulent transaction by asking them to download and install protective software on their computer.
After downloading and installing the software, the fraudster requests that customers enter their information and log into their banking profile.
If the customer does this, their PC screen will turn black, and they will begin receiving OTPs to confirm transactions that they did not complete. The fraudster then requests the OTPs so that they can immediately block the transactions. Unfortunately, this is used to defraud the customer instead.
Both Discovery and FNB advised customers to avoid interacting with unknown links and downloading unknown software.
If customers are contacted by ostensibly bank representatives asking them to download or follow links, they should end the call and contact customer service.
Banks will never ask you to forward OTPs, download software, or enter banking information.
“Never disclose sensitive information, such as your username, password, card and PIN details to anyone – not even a bank official,” FNB said.
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