Experts Find 16,000+ Scam FIFA World Cup Domains

Security researchers have warned of a deluge of phishing scams, bogus apps and malicious merchandising sites spoofing the branding of the FIFA Environment Cup in Qatar to goal football admirers.

Group-IB stated it tracked over 16,000 fraud domains and 40 destructive apps in the Google Enjoy keep that were using FIFA Planet Cup 2022 branding to lure users.

Scammers are employing a array of methods to portion soccer fans from their income, private data and qualifications.

They’ve introduced fake merchandising web sites and spoofed ticketing internet sites built to harvest money and/or bank aspects from victims. In both conditions, social media marketplace adverts and malicious social media accounts help to direct targeted traffic to the phony internet sites, Team-IB mentioned.

The fake applications are set up to do a similar work – stealing banking and account qualifications by promising entry to acquire tickets.

In other conditions, rip-off position web-sites have been set up using the World Cup as a entice to steal victims’ private details. Team-IB stated it spotted at least 5 of these, making use of keyword phrases such as “job” and “Qatar,” and driving targeted visitors to the web pages from over 30 specially created social media pages.

Yet another tactic is to make faux surveys impersonating main brand names, as very well as the Planet Cup alone. These guarantee a present for filling out the variety with personal information and phone numbers. Victims are also usually questioned to share a connection to the rip-off on WhatsApp, the report claimed.

Group-IB discovered more than 16,000 of these pretend surveys.

The security business also uncovered that above 90 end users of the official fan ID application, Hayya, experienced their accounts hijacked after passwords have been lifted via commodity information-stealing malware these kinds of as RedLine and Erbium.

“Threat actors have a observe file of seeking to income in on important functions, in particular people in the sporting globe,” discussed Sharef Hlal, Group-IB’s head of the electronic risk protection analytics team in the Middle East and Africa.

“The aim of this research was to increase consciousness of the multiple distinct sorts of frauds that people may possibly be confronted with through the Globe Cup, and we urge internet people to be on substantial alert and double check any domain that they come across on social media or through messengers.”

Earlier this thirty day period Digital Shadows launched exploration revealing likewise popular initiatives to income in on the levels of competition by means of spoofed domains, phony apps and fraudulent social media pages.

Editorial credit rating icon impression: ArifAsif / Shutterstock.com

Some elements of this write-up are sourced from:
www.infosecurity-journal.com