The Government’s cyber security agency has recorded a “massive” jump in online fraud, with scammers draining nearly $9 million from unsuspecting victims in just three months.
Twelve victims lost more than $100,000 each as cyber criminals deployed a devious array of elaborate scams to trick people into giving over their money and personal details, or infiltrated their computers and bank accounts through malware or remote access trojan software.
Data obtained by the Herald from CERT NZ shows the agency received more than 10,000 cyber security reports in the last year relating to phishing attacks, scams and fraud, unauthorised access to email or bank accounts, denial of service attempts, ransom or malware attacks and compromised websites.
The agency admits such attacks are “widespread” with many more going unreported.
Cyber criminals obtained nearly $9m in the last quarter alone (July-September) – a huge spike on the previous quarter ($3.9m) and the quarter before that ($3.7m).
CERT NZ says the number of reported incidents has remained reasonably static in recent months, but the number of attacks resulting in loss through fraudulent criminal activity and unauthorised access to victims’ accounts has jumped by about 30 per cent.
The figures include cases like the Invercargill pensioner who lost $134,000 when thieves infiltrated his SBS Bank accounts in July, changed his listed mobile phone numbers to skirt the bank’s two-factor authentication security checks, then…
