With the increase in technology over the past few years, what we have seen is that there has been an increase in cyber frauds all across the globe. But, as a fund recovery group, First Option Recovery has always stood up against time and performed to the best of their abilities to curb the crime. The best fund recovery group in the world is the first of its kind in the world to have an in house team of dedicated cybersecurity specialists who deal with cyber frauds on a daily basis. Their prime job is to investigate all the aspects of these kinds of cyber frauds and the evolving one as well. Being at the top of the business for over a decade now, we have been constantly improving our team to cater to the needs of the larger audience.
Types of Cyber Frauds
Cyber Frauds are many. But some of them are more prominent than the others. For example, the most common ones include phishing, email spamming, and cyberstalking.
Phishing and Spamming
Phishing and email spamming are probably two sides of the same coin where you will either receive an email or a notification as to the very fact that you have won some lottery or some bitcoin/crypto and all you need to do is click on a link and enter your details. When it comes to entering your details, you will see that many times, you will have to input your credit card details as well. Sad but true, the reality is that many people end up doing so and end up being victims of cyber fraud. First Option Recovery clearly states that you should avoid such notifications at all costs no matter what happens.
Social Media Giveaways
Ever wondered if Elon Musk or Bill Gates decides to give a crypto giveaway, literally how many people will sign up for that? The number might be hard for you to guess because in actuality, it can be humongous. But what if I say that the profile from which Mr Musk decides to commit the giveaway is actually a fake one. Surprised?
Let’s take the discussion forward.
On a fine Sunday morning, a scammer decides to commit a new type of fraud. He goes to Twitter or Instagram and starts searching those profiles with a substantial following and a verified Symbol. Also, he decides to go on the Profile description and sees if the “Page” is for sale or not. If yes, he decides to buy the page for a few hundred dollars. Soon, he starts to increase the number of followers on the page via certain ways. He posts a lot of good posts and once the followers in that particular page turns into a humongous amount, he decides to change the name and profile image of the product to something popular like Bill Gates or Elon Musk. Then he announces a Bitcoin or some other crypto giveaway where you can receive a huge amount like 1000BTC and for that very giveaway, you need to first participate there via a small deposit. The scammer also promotes the post via Social Media Ads as well. This is where you will see that many people will mistake the profile as a genuine one and end up participating in the giveaway. Little do they know that this giveaway is nothing but a fraudulent one.
Crypto Jacking & Ransomware Injection
A newer kind of cyber fraud is cryptojacking, which is nothing but the unauthorized use of someone’s computer by another crypto miner as a means to mine cryptocurrency. All the hacker needs to do is inject some malware or ransomware into the victim’s computer and you are good to go. It can also be done by infecting a website or an online ad with some code that will auto-execute once the victim’s browser pops it out. In majority of the cases, the victim is quite unaware of the situation. A normal lag or delay in performing basic tasks in a computer is the first sign of you being a victim of cryptojacking.
Whenever you open certain websites, particularly the ones that are restricted, you will be greeted with a message or a pop-up as to how your system has been affected and you need to download a software to make it virus free. This is a pop-up that will aid you in the process of cryptojacking. When the malicious code enters the system (you have installed it of course), then the infected program starts running and executes certain information that one needs to aware of. The scammer will then use your computer to inject the code and use it to mine cryptocurrencies.
Also, at the same time, it may also happen that the hacker takes control of a particular website and injects it with malicious code. If the hacker finds it difficult to do so, then what it is going to do is redirect the website to a new URL which is nothing but an exact replica of the same website. When the original website is opened, the website will stay that the URL has moved to a new location, the one that the hacker has created. Once you open the new website, you will see that the new one is exactly similar to the original one. The new website will then spam you with all kinds of pop-ups so that you can install the code in your system and then he gets hold of your system to perform the desired act of cryptomining. If you think you have been scammed, it is recommended to report the cyber fraud to First Option Recovery immediately.
Drug and Weapon Trade
Although not specifically a cyber fraud, but the government has classified it into one, the dark web is the hub of all illegal activities across the world. And the sad part is that the majority of the deals happen in cryptos because of its encrypted nature. These cryptos are a favourite means of trade for all kinds of sales including endangered animals and human organs. Scary indeed it is, but the buyers and sellers both remain anonymous every time. And the sad part is that if you lose your money, there is no way of getting it back at all unless you get hold of a solid fund recovery group to help you out.
Misusing Personal Information a.k.a. Identity Theft
Identity theft is one of the most common cyber frauds out there. It is often a byproduct of phishing and email spamming where all you need to do is click on a particular link where you need to input all your details and at the same time give out your credit card details. What you don’t realize is that one someone has your credit card number, they can misuse it in a number of ways which is often accompanied by an unrecognized transaction from your card.
Software Piracy
Another major cyber fraud is software piracy where you can find a lot of illegal stuff on the internet for free. Stuff like movies, books or masterclasses are fully available for free on the internet and this is clearly illegal. This is the point of using someone else’s intellectual property that is totally copyrighted to reduce their revenue at one go. The unauthorized distribution of such copies is a clear vindication of the law and takes us to the point where we need to do something to curb this thing at one go.
Salami Slicing Attack
Imagine when you are sitting with a million dollars and someone steals a few cents from your account. Would you notice the subtle difference? In most probabilities, it would be a NO. This is exactly what Salami Slicing attack means where the cyber criminals steal your funds and resources with a small amount over a period of time. Since the difference is small, you would notice that the scammer easily gets away with the crime. The rounding off of your bank figures often figuratively fail to collect enough evidence as to the fact that one’s funds are being misplaced. It goes by the same technique when hackers insert a code or logic bomb to exploit the network and gain access to the system. Once you have gained access, best of luck protecting your funds.
Data diddling
When one ends up changing the data before entering it to the final table and ends up having disastrous consequences, then the data diddling has supposedly said to have taken place. Anyone can do it and it mostly relates to accounting and other stuff where one can manipulate the data in favor of the scammer. You can end up being a victim of some manipulative counterfeited documents or even money can be stolen from you. You might be paid a part of your salary and the other part may be manipulated and later stolen from you. Hence, one needs to be very cautious about the data diddling stuff.
Stalking
There is no end to stalking and it includes cyber frauds as well. The sad part is that stalking can be of any type, like cyberstalking or offline stalking. But with the boom of the internet, cyberstalking has become rampant. The stalker basically reads all your information and follows all your tactics. Often when they find out that the person has done something that is not to much of his or her liking, they start harassing the victims by blackmailing them via email, phone or text. Many end up falling victims and soon lose out on their patience and fearfully do all those stuff that the stalker tells them to do.
Gold CyberFraud
A few months ago, a lot of people were getting emails as to how buying land in the Carribean Islands (Jamaica) can help them a lot. It was said that gold has been found in this very land that they are going to purchase and as a result they should invest in it. After investing and waiting for the gold to be extracted was a long process. When they called the customer care of the investment firm, it was said that they now need to pay taxes because of the very fact that the gold belonged to the government. Sad but true, soon they realized that it was nothing but a fraudulent way to extort money from them.
Crypto Investment Scam
This is a pretty common one where some new cryptocurrency would occur and then you would be promised huge returns. Many people would invest in them and soon enough, when the crypto founders have earned enough money, they would run away all of a sudden. Bitconnect Cash is one classic example.
The other way is that crypto investment firms often tell their customers that they have developed certain advanced technologies to deal with immense profitable trades on the long run. As a result, they ask their customers to invest as much money as they can and soon enough they send a few profits. Seeing these, the customer ends up investing more and more and when the time comes to reap in the profits, the firm vanishes in thin air completely. PlusToken is a classic example of this type of firm.
Crypto PlusToken CryptoFraud – A classic example of a cyber fraud
This was billion-dollar crypto scandal that lead to a lot of investors losing their money. The operation happened in the remote island of Vanuatu where it was seen that Chinese individuals were running a crypto fraud based on the membership pattern. Estimated at $5.7 billion, over a hundred members have been arrested so far due to this act.
A High Yield Investment scheme, finally framed into a Ponzi scheme, Vanuatu offered massive rewards in form of returns (close to 18%) that made many people believe in them and eventually invest. The larger you invest, the more returns you get. The typical Ponzi scheme created an illusion among the investors that the funds that they are going to accentuate the process of creating crypto-related products such as the PlusToken Wallet and Exchange. However, upon proper investigation, it was found out that the returns that were generated were earned via new signups and those were exactly how old members of PlusToken were paid. Soon one day, it vanished all of a sudden leaving all members to utter dismay.
What to do if you have been a victim of any kind of cyber frauds?
If you have been a victim of any kind of cyber fraud, what you need to do is contact our in-house team of cyber-security specialists at First Option Recovery. Owing to the amazing team of the best recovery specialists along with the newly created a team of cyber-specialists, which starts its work immediately after the online fraud reporting process has taken place, a first for a recovery firm of this kind, what we can vow is excellent service both in terms of helping you with the money lost and at the same time it is highly recommend to report cyber fraud practices to us as quickly as possible so that we can bust them in the near future.