Currently, there are criminals phoning you to advise you there is a parcel to be delivered. At the same time, they send you an e-mail containing a link purportedly containing your delivery note. This actually contains an e-banking Trojan though.
Your phone rings. A lady with an Eastern European accent tells you she is scheduling a delivery for you. Due to Corona, she has sent you your delivery note by e-mail. You will simply have to print this out, sign and hand it to the driver. With most recent cases, this may also involve a recorded message. (Source: cybercrimepolice.ch)
There are criminals behind such calls. And the link contained in the e-mail serves to infect a victim’s computer with an e-banking Trojan. Once installed, all future e-banking activities are redirected to the perpetrators, who will then modify your payments and redirect your remittances to their own account.
Currently, it is mainly SMEs which are contacted in this way. Private individuals might however also be affected. The most perfidious thing is that current antivirus software will not find any malware on an infected PC, and that SMS verification is circumvented.
As of late, there has been large-scale data theft from infected companies too. Several weeks after the initial infection, these data are encrypted and used to blackmail SMEs (ransomware).
Please note the following to ensure you don’t fall victim to this scam:
- Never click on any link in the e-mail received.
- Write down the fraudster’s telephone number and report this to the police.
- If you have already clicked any such link, contact your financial institution immediately and mention that your computer might just be infected with an e-banking Trojan. Stop using your computer immediately, and have it reinstalled from scratch. Report this as an offence to your local police station.
- If you are not quite sure or something is not clear, please contact your financial institution.
Further information and examples can be found here: www.cybercrimepolice.ch (German)
Additional general information on phishing can also be found in our article on Phishing.
