The Judiciary Police (PJ) are warning the public to beware of fraudulent text messages sent by purported telecom companies.
According to a PJ statement on Saturday, the Judiciary Police have recently received several reports from residents that criminals claiming to be staff members of a local “telecom company” had sent them fraudulent text messages with links to a website, which falsely claimed that their bonus points were due to expire soon, so as to lure the victims to log into the bogus website to redeem them. The statement added that the victims were asked to enter their credit card numbers and verification code as instructed by the website, after which they immediately received a notice from a financial institution pointing out that there was a suspicious transaction on the credit card, and it was suspected that the credit card details had been stolen from the website.
The statement underlined that a follow-up PJ investigation confirmed that no such text message had been sent by the telecom company concerned.
The PJ statement did not reveal the name of the telecom company.
The Judiciary Police urged members of the public to be vigilant if they receive similar text messages, urging them not to log into any suspicious website links sent with text messages or provide any personal information, adding that they should pay special attention to avoid credit card theft, especially if they are asked to provide credit card details, transaction passwords and verification codes.
The statement underlined that members of the public should pay more attention to network security information, strengthen their personal awareness and stay alert for fake and phishing websites, and always pay attention to whether the website address is exactly the same as the official one, as well as to install anti-virus software for mobile devices or computers and update it regularly.
According to Wiktionary, phishing is the malicious act of running a false website or sending a false e-mail with the intent of masquerading as a trustworthy entity in order to acquire sensitive information, such as usernames, passwords, and credit card details.
Anyone who believes they have fallen victim to fraud or other crimes should call the PJ’s hotline on 993 or the fraud prevention hotline on 8800 7777 for assistance, the statement said.
This poster provided by the Judiciary Police (PJ) on Saturday warns the public to beware of phony text messages from ‘telecom firms’.
