Scammers in Russia have discovered a new way to deceive tourists using Telegram bots. Bots create fake pages for online services for booking hotels, renting real estate, and finding fellow travelers. This was announced on Thursday, April 8, by the head of the special projects department of the department of protection against digital risks of Group-IB Yakov Kravtsov of RIA Novosti.
“In their schemes, scammers register fake accounts and, using Telegram bots developed by criminal gangs, generate phishing pages,” he explained.
According to Kravtsov, bots in the Telegram messenger create fake pages of online services with payment according to the specified parameters.
“Many Internet users have already become victims of such fraud, the average bill for one theft is 500-1500 rubles. And in the case of the purchase of goods, the damage amounts to tens of thousands of rubles, ”he said.
Some criminals open a special trading account, with the help of which the bank card details entered into the phishing form allow fraudsters to completely write off all funds from the card.
Group-IB experts advise using only official sites or applications for correspondence with users and paying for services, as well as not making a prepayment for services. According to Kravtsov, cybercriminals often try to lead a potential victim of deception to third-party resources or messengers, where they send a link to a phishing resource.
“If you open a suspicious site, you should carefully study the domain name. In most cases, fraudsters register domain names that are consonant with the brand, ”the expert said.
Group-IB specializes in information and cyber security. Since the spring of last year, the company’s specialists have recorded an increase in fraud using brands of courier services, marketplaces, and later online services for booking hotels, renting real estate, as well as services for finding travel companions.
In early March, security experts warned Russians that scammers began collecting information for blackmail from Telegram bots. As Anton Dolgalev, Deputy Head of the Department for Protection against Digital Risks at Group-IB, explained, fraudsters can blackmail a person using the data obtained in bots, while, even having received money from the victim, they can continue to blackmail this person.