-Over 6.7 million reports of spam in apps after the fourth quarter••• An increase of about 650,000 from the same period last year
-Influence of debt,’stocks and investment’, the most reported’loan solicitation’ Spam accounts for half of all reports
-If you suspect voice phishing or smishing, you can easily check it with the Whoo app
[코리아포스트 한글판 장영수기자] On the 24th, Huhu & Company (CEO Tae-beom Heo), which provides a spam blocking application’Hoohoo’ service, released statistics on spam calls and text messages reported by Huhu users in the fourth quarter of last year. In the fourth quarter, 6.67 million spam reports were received, an increase of about 656,000 cases compared to the same period last year.
When the report details are categorized by content, the’stock/investment’ spam is the type that showed the largest increase compared to the same period last year. A typical technique is to share unsubstantial investment information such as power stocks and operational stocks, or extortion of usage fees in the name of stock stock recommendations.
The number of reports of this type was about 1.54 million, an increase of 62% from the same period last year. In the second half of last year, the stock craze of individual investors led to an increase in related spam. The share of stocks and investments in all reports also increased, ranking second in the most reported types.
The number one report type is’loan solicitation’ spam. As for this type, a total of 1.82 million reports were received, an increase of 660,000 cases compared to the same period last year. This is the number that broke the highest number of reports of the same type since quarterly spam statistics were released.
Along with the boom in debt, the cessation of bank loans in the fourth quarter of last year seems to have had a decisive effect. When low-interest credit loans were blocked, third-party financial institutions and illegal loan business operations went viral.
In the report of’Smishing’, a fraudulent method that abused text messages, the influence of’young ties and debts’ was found. The number of smishing reports in the fourth quarter of 2020 was 124,849, an increase of about 30,000 from the same period last year.
In particular, smishing’s techniques are diversifying not only by impersonating the former parcel delivery service and reception letter, but also by impersonating a letter to promote loans from savings banks and credit card companies.
Meanwhile,’illegal games and gambling’ spam, which ranked first in the annual report type for three years from 2017 to 2019, showed a slowing trend. The number of reports of this type was 1.41 million, ranking only in third place in the ranking of the most reported types due to loan recommendations and stocks and investments.
Huhu & Company CEO Tae-beom Heo said, “Unlike illegal games and gambling, spam related to stocks and loans requires thorough attention as it can impersonate institutional financial institutions.” If in doubt, you should install the Whoo app to check whether you are smishing.”
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