The FIFA World Cup appears to have provided a fresh opportunity to cyber frauds to target those looking to buy tickets online.
According to cybersecurity experts, once scammers are approached by someone for a ticket, they respond via direct message and provide details of how to buy it for rates ranging between $50 and $120. They insist on using PayPal’s ‘Family and Friends’ payment mode. PayPal doesn’t allow paying for goods under this money transfer option, and such transactions are not covered under its fraud protection programme.
Facebook has at least 6-7 active groups run by scammers, said Nandakishore Harikumar, CEO and founder of Technisanct, a cybersecurity firm.
A spokesperson for Meta, Facebook’s parent company, stated it won’t be able to share its response until they have “looked into the matter”.
Such groups exist on Twitter and Telegram, too. “Since its launch, Telegram has actively moderated harmful content on its platform – including potential scams. Through user reports and proactive moderation of public chats (such as public groups and channels), Telegram has banned millions of chats and accounts for violating our Terms of Service. As Telegram continues to rapidly grow around the world, we are working to expand both our Terms of Service and moderation efforts to explicitly restrict and more effectively combat other misuse of the Telegram platform, such as encouraging fraud,” Telegram…
