A story posted on South China Morning Post's "This Week in Asia" speaks of a prevalence of high-level scams targeting unsuspecting victims from Hong Kong, Singapore, China, and Australia. These fraudulent schemes now seem to look more credible with new sophisticated gimmicks.
Scammers Up Schemes with New Tricks
Scammers are now using the Internet to ensnare more victims. They search through social media profiles to entice their targets with advertisements, articles, or postings.
According to experts, fraudsters understand their victims' emotions and weaponize an online space where their targets communicate freely, giving up clues about their aspirations and habits with each phone swipe. This type of scheme is referred to as social engineering.
Security software firm Kaspersky tells us that social engineering is a trick used to obtain sensitive data, access, or assets by taking advantage of human error.
These "human hacking" scams are common in cybercrime because they frequently persuade unsuspecting individuals to expose data, spread malware infections, or grant access to restricted systems.
Attacks can happen online, in person, and via other interactions. Social engineering scams are created with an understanding of human behavior and thought processes.
This technique is what this new breed of hackers is doing to victimize more people in the region. They understand their victim's emotions like trust, guilt, greed, love, and loneliness.
As a result, social engineering attacks are beneficial for influencing a user's behavior. When an attacker is aware of the driving forces behind a user's behavior, they can trick and control the user better.
Lonely Princes and Refugees
Many well-known frauds use intricate tales to dupe victims into following their bidding. If you have been scammed or know someone who has, you are probably aware that many scams begin with a Middle Eastern prince or a widow from Afghanistan telling you that they were thrown out in a coup and have a billion dollars.
"Be mindful of your emotions," Thai fact-checker Nattakorn Ploddee told This Week in Asia. "This is similar to a romance scam, instead of romance this group of scammers are feeding on sympathy instead."
Scammers will be feeding off victims' empathy to gain their trust. And this false sense of confidence they have established will be the key to victims disclosing essential information such as bank details or manipulating them to send funds out of pity.
However, only a small percentage of people are susceptible to these narrative-based scams. Some people may conduct a few Google searches before believing what anyone has told them. The worrying thing is that easily accessible online data now back up some scammers.
Now, name check demonstrates how scammers scour the Internet for information, assembling various sources to make a tale appear credible.
Based on the same SCMP report, with the Internet at their disposal and targets to hit, scammers are getting more plausible, according to scam busters.
Data security experts advise internet users to browse with caution and knowledge. The PSA also underlines how cybercriminals are always looking for new methods to make money at the expense of other people's safety. It is also critical to be cautious about who you share your personal information with.
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