As non-face-to-face financial transactions increase due to Corona 19, voice phishing (telephone financial fraud) is on the rise again. In the past, voice phishing was a method of encouraging victims to remit money or stealing personal information by calling randomly.
In recent years, the method of targeting victims is evolving, changing the display number of Internet calls from foreign countries like a domestic number such as ‘010’ by installing a private repeater.
In particular, the police warned that there are increasing cases of being investigated after installing private repeaters in their homes by going to advertisements under the name of’Internet monitoring side jobs, part-time home jobs’ without knowing whether they are being used for voice phishing.
According to the National Police Agency on the 21st, the total number of voice phishing damage last year amounted to 31681, with the damage alone reaching 700 billion won. With an average of 87 cases per day, the amount of damage is 1.9 billion won. Compared to 2016 (17,040 cases, damage amount 1468 billion won), the number of incidents increased 86%, but the amount of damage increased 377%. It means that the damage increased once you were voice phishing.
The police also belatedly declared war on voice phishing. On this day, the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency announced, “We have decided to eradicate voice phishing, an anti-social civil livelihood violation, as the core task of the Seoul Police this year.” Seoul Police Commissioner Jang Ha-yeon said, “We set a goal to reduce voice phishing by 50% this year (compared to last year).” In November of last year, the Seoul Police Agency formed an intensive response team that acts as a control tower, and established a collaboration system that collects and investigates cases that were individually investigated at the front line police station, and collects and analyzes crime data.
[최희석 기자 / 차창희 기자]
As non-face-to-face transactions increase, phishing begins again… Financial sector
Corporate Official Instagram Account Impersonation
“Register your card to receive a gift”
Evolving from phone calls to social media scams
Tricked into “Internet Home Alba”
Changing the phone number to `010`
Diagram of repeater installation in the public’s house
The annual damage amount reached 700 billion
81.3 billion won back last year’s victims
A new kind of voice phishing using social network service (SNS), which has become a means of publicity, is in full swing. Companies, institutions, and individual businesses are exploiting the fact that they open official pages on social media and hold events for members. Hackers open fake SNS pages that mimic the official page and send messages to induce them to access a specific web page link or register card information. Through this, damage cases have occurred in which malicious codes are distributed or money is deducted with card information entered by users.
In particular,’Instagram’, which is active in corporate and brand activities, is the main target. Recently, companies such as Orion, KitKat Korea, and Chupa Chups Korea told users through an Instagram page announcement, “Currently, impersonation accounts are asking for link clicks and card registration. We never ask for card information through SNS.” He also called for attention. Even last year, there was a case of stealing ID and password by impersonating Instagram itself and sending a message stating, “Because I violated the copyright of the photo, if I do not clarify it through a link within 24 hours, I will close my account.”
An official from Instagram Korea said, “We are protecting users through the official account authentication badge and the impersonation account reporting function.” It was produced and distributed.”
Starting this year, a new voice phishing method using repeaters that modulates Internet calling numbers from overseas such as China into ‘010’, which is a domestic number, is increasing. As a result of the actual police crackdown, 161 repeaters, 203 sim chips, and 25 cannon phones were detected in 52 locations across the country. There have also been many cases where the general public installs repeaters in their homes in the name of part-time jobs. This is a case where a repeater was installed in one’s own residence, believing in an advertisement that it may be used for voice phishing, and that it is recruiting a side job for Internet monitoring or a part-time job at home.
The new voice phishing technique has become so sophisticated that even office workers in their 20s and 30s will suffer. In fact, at the end of last year, a 35-year-old office worker who had been voice phishing without his knowledge said, “I was first contacted by KakaoTalk pretending to be an officer of the Ministry of Justice. “I thought it was officially made by the Ministry of Justice, but I didn’t even dream that it was voice phishing,” he said. He confessed, “The call logs were erased by remote control, so I couldn’t confirm who I was talking to later.”
As voice phishing evolves into a threatening combination with new technologies, it is pointed out that a omnidirectional response is necessary. In a report on “Digital Finance and Cyber Security in 2021,” the Financial Security Agency said, “Voice phishing prevention and security also need to be advanced based on artificial intelligence (AI).” “Financial apps should be equipped with voice phishing prevention functions. “He said. However, in the financial sector, investments related to accident prevention are not actively made, focusing on the convenience of users. In particular, it was found that small-scale P2Ps, etc., are easy to target because account transfer is relatively easy if you log in after entering your ID and password.
The bigger problem is that it is as difficult as picking stars in the sky to conserve damage from voice phishing. Last year, the police returned 81.3 billion won to the victim’s hands out of total crimes such as voice phishing as well as fraud. This is a 16% increase from the previous year in 2019. However, last year alone, voice phishing alone amounted to 700 billion won. It is a story that there is still a long way to go.
Compared to the ever-new method, the police response has been on the level of investigating only after receiving a report. It is pointed out that other than the activities of arresting and punishing criminal organizations, there was insufficient publicity about security measures or new methods for prevention.
Lee Yun-ho, a professor at the Department of Police Department at Korea Cyber University, said, “We need to cultivate forensic investigations and cyber investigation techniques to the best of the voice phishing criminals, and then reliably punish them.” Emphasized. He pointed out that “the police should continue to educate and promote new techniques so that citizens can be alert.”
[오대석 기자 / 이진한 기자 / 차창희 기자]
[ⓒ 매일경제 & mk.co.kr, 무단전재 및 재배포 금지]