That Black Friday Sale Website Could Be A Con, Cyber Researchers Warn

NEW DELHI: If Black Friday sales, cryptocurrency or online shopping excites you, then here’s something you should know about before cyber frauds get the better of you. 

According to a new report by a cyber security firm, threat actors are hosting websites for malicious campaigns. These campaigns are centred around the Black Friday sales and e-commerce, cryptocurrency and travel are the top targets, revealed the report by CloudSEK.

Researchers found cybercrime forums across various languages are rife with chatter about Black Friday.

“Black Friday” refers to the Friday after Thanksgiving in the US and it traditionally marks the start of the Christmas shopping season. In recent years, the word started catching up in other parts of the world, too, particularly vis-a-vis online shopping.

While some threat actors are promoting their malicious services or campaigns, others are looking to avail them, according to CloudSEK researchers who also discovered an Ethereum giveaway scam website.

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“Compromised personal identifiable information (PII) and banking credentials can be used to perform unauthorised transactions and social engineering attacks,” the Bengaluru-based cyber security research firm warned.

CloudSEK’s contextual AI digital risk platform ‘XVigil’ discovered hundreds of Black Friday-themed domains registered and operational.

Common forms of attacks included the impersonation of legitimate websites, services for Google or Facebook ads, and the spread of malicious applications.

“Various elements come into play here, right from hosting a website to gaining critical information of victims by using different techniques. Threat actors are constantly looking for opportunities to siphon crucial data or money,” Cyber Threat Researcher, CloudSEK, Rishika Desai said.

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The finding showed that website cloning is a common technique used by hackers of all levels of sophistication to host fake instances of legitimate websites.

“The iconic Black Friday sale has become a global theme now where cybercriminals at every level and expertise try their best to launch malicious campaigns. Most of these campaigns misuse or impersonate popular brands and companies providing sales and services to cheat the public,” Desai added.

The researchers have advised netizens to be aware of the freebies, attractive deals and seemingly suspicious third-party solutions in order to stay clear of falling prey to online frauds. 

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