Electronic pick-pockets on the loose

Despite of all the good things brought about by the Internet technology, this sophisticated communication tool has developed a ‘long hand’, and is literally stealing billions of shillings from pockets and bank accounts of its users.

Studies shows that thousands of criminals, mostly from the western and southern parts of Africa, America and even Britain are using attractive and seductive email massages to lure innocent victims into divulging their personal bank account details without knowing that they are being conned.

The conmen sometimes send email messages to millions of addresses (but targeting account holders of particular banks) insinuating that a problem has been detected with their online account information, which needs to be rectified immediately.

The message therefore prompts users to log in their confidential banking details as a matter of agency. The global address or URL provided on the email comes with a well crafted logo and finer details to mimic that of the bank in question, thus deceiving the victims.

Account

In a different system, the fraudsters hack into their victims’ email accounts, and send a distress mail to all addresses found in the inbox seeking desperate help from innocent friends and relatives. They usually change the original password, thus denying the original user access to the email account.

Most common are mails indicating that the legitimate owner of the address is currently stranded in a foreign country. Such a message claims that all his or her money including personal effects and documents have been stolen. The message therefore requests the recipients to help out by sending money through any appropriate money transfer mechanism.

This means that if one falls a victim, then the money has to be sent to an alternative recipient’s name, since it is clear that the ‘intended’ recipient has allegedly lost the necessary documents needed to withdraw cash. In case the recipient replies by email, then the message is received by the con man, who later offers directives on how the money can be sent.

This kind of theft mostly targets hard cash ranging from Sh 100,000 to Sh 500,000. According to information technology experts, the hackers use software called Spyware, which is secretly installed on one’s computer sometimes using the internet, and copies information without the permission or knowledge of the user.

“Spyware may take personal information, business information, and bandwidth from the computer or processing capacity and secretly gives it to someone else,” said Samuel Scooby, a Nairobi based computer expert.

Through this, conmen can access the victim’s entire confidential information, thus keep track of all email correspondence allowing them to monitor movements of their target ‘customer’.

Sometimes when an air ticket is issued through the same mail, it gives the thugs a great opportunity to con the victim’s friends and relatives because they know exactly where their ‘customer’ is.

Legitimate

Another sophisticated method used in internet frauds is what experts refer to as Phishing. Through this, the criminals can target electronic banking identification information of legitimate online customers of a particular bank, then use the information to transfer monies from the victim’s account to a different one.

“The term ‘phishing’ refers to the use of spam emails purporting to be from a particular bank. In this way criminals ‘fish’ for legitimate bank customer’s logon information with an intention of transferring their savings to a different account,” said Scooby.

Spam is a generic term used to describe electronic ‘junk mail’ or unwanted messages sent to your email account or mobile phone. These messages vary, but are essentially commercial and often annoying in their sheer volume.

They may try to persuade you to buy a product or service, or visit a website where you can make purchases; or they may attempt to trick you into divulging your bank account or credit card details.

A study done by Nirph Digital Ltd, a US based banking security solution provider shows that in the year 2008 alone, 10 million individuals in the US were victims of internet fraud. As a result, $ 48 billion (Sh 3.8 trillion) reportedly found way to the fraudsters’ pockets by the end of the year.

America is the most affected because according to statistics, more than a half of it’s citizens pay their bills and transfer their cash through the internet. In Africa, many victims have reported of having received a message explaining that there are unclaimed millions.