Phone scams are becoming increasingly more frequent in Russia. More and more Russians have to deal with these attacks. Kasperky Lab experts found (in a survey quoted by RBC) that over 30% people in Russia have had some experience with phone hacking and one in every ten people targeted by such attack have sustained financial losses.
Financial fraud is the most common type of phone-related crimes. Hackers call mobile numbers and coax out personal data linked to bank products, primarily credit cards. Earlier, Invest Foresight reported about a common scam when hackers pretend to be bank representatives warning customers about suspicious transactions on their account and offer ways to ‘rescue’ the savings.
Phone hackers usually manage to avoid liability. The survey found that only 4% of Russians reported attacks to law enforcement. It is even more alarming that people are still not used to defending themselves against phone scammers. Also according to the survey, 21% people do not protect their smart phone and only 17% use special anti-hacking software. As a result the only method remains to not answer unidentified calls.