PSP warned on Thursday that there had been “several incidents” in the first half of this year related to “spoofing” – a practice that involves falsifying personal data and can lead to computer fraud.
In its statement, the National PSP Authority gives various security tips and asks to report all cases of fraud, including simple attempts.
“Protect yourself from criminals who protect themselves behind a screen,” stresses PSP.
“Spoofing” involves falsifying objects such as an “email”, phone number, “website”, IP address, etc. to create the appearance of legitimacy and trustworthiness of that contact in order to deceive the victim.
According to PSP, the “most recurring” reported cases involve “spoofing” of “emails”, calls and SMS (messages).
“The cybercriminal uses computer systems to replicate ‘e-mail’ addresses and telephone numbers, impersonating banking institutions, well-known companies or government agencies, in order to obtain the victim’s personal data or credentials for criminal purposes,” the National Agency describes in a note published Thursday.
PSP warns that “these situations can happen to anyone,” and therefore emphasizes: “Prevention is the best safety method.”
Police advise you to be sceptical of any phone call or text message that contains a generic greeting instead of the recipient’s real name or a personalised message addressed to the recipient.
In the event of messages or phone calls from supposed banking institutions requesting codes, credentials or passwords, the authenticity of the request should be verified with the relevant banking institution.
When you come across “emails” or SMS messages containing questionable “links”, you should ignore them and delete the messages immediately.
It is also recommended not to publish your phone number on social networks and manually block numbers from unwanted and suspicious calls.
It is considered important to “observe the warning about calls or SMS marked as “spam”. [lixo] on the latest telephone devices.”
And when receiving an “email” or any other message that demonstrates “spoofing” practices, the alleged sender should be informed of what has happened to help prevent further cyber attacks of this type.
“They can do this on the websites of the target companies, which usually have pages where you can report spoofing and other security issues,” PSP concludes.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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