New ‘Pig Butchering’ Scam in West Africa Impersonates US Financial Advisors

A malicious marketing campaign impersonating American fiscal advisors has been noticed concentrating on various hundred individuals in West Africa.

Recently found by cybersecurity authorities at DomainTools, the ‘pig butchering’ operation uses a complicated network of social engineering procedures to defraud victims.

Describing the activity in an advisory shared with Infosecurity, DomainTools said most attacks from the unnamed danger actor utilized skilled network providers these types of as LinkedIn to detect, research and call opportunity victims.

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“Notably, fraud actors linked with this marketing campaign frequent social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram,” the advisory adds.

Even further, DomainTools described that due to the complexity of manipulating a goal when impersonating a fiscal advisor, rip-off web sites relating to these functions ought to stay accessible for as lengthy as attainable.

“Therefore, the selection of a hosting provider is critical to the good results of this fraud,” the company wrote. “Many of these impersonation sites have stay chat widgets, making it possible for potential victims to interact with the impersonated money advisor promptly.”

Far more usually, DomainTools CTO Sean McNee instructed Infosecurity via email that this pig butchering campaign is significantly advanced for many causes.

“[It] is noteworthy for the sheer scale of fiscal advisors impersonated and how brazen they are at producing impersonation internet websites,” McNee claimed.

“From our research, we believe that this team of menace actors has a physical existence in West Africa, is performing in tandem with a ‘bulletproof’ hosting reseller, and that the campaign is however ongoing with incredibly considerable losses, quite possibly in the tens of millions of dollars.”

The CTO also defined that firms fearing identical attacks ought to be proactive in creating procedures to avoid their workers from becoming victims.

“Investment businesses and their fiscal advisors must be on the notify for fraudulent domains, while new investment decision purchasers will need to thoroughly confirm the identification of any advisor they operate with to keep away from turning into sufferer to this convincing form of fraud.”

A individual pig butchering marketing campaign concentrating on US victims was investigated by the country’s Office of Justice in November 2022.