Delivery Scams Skyrocket in the Face of COVID-19

The Coronavirus has turned the likes of Amazon, UPS, Doordash and other delivery services into the vital industry that poses great risk to their employees. But there is an underlying threat to all of this, and it involves malicious actors.

This current crisis is like Christmas to these type of hackers. They see emails and account numbers and want to take this information for themselves. So through social engineering and phishing, they send out fake emails or text messages. An example of an Amazon scam is as follows: Hackers would send out a message saying that your package is late or missing and they need your information to confirm. Once you submit your information, they have everything they need to hack into your personal life. Other ways they can trick people include:

• Inserting images of documents in a message to add credibility
• Requesting additional information from customers to deliver packages
• Asking users to collect parcels from a warehouse and including details in a malicious attachment
• Inserting statements in emails that mention that attachments are scanned by a mail security solution and found to contain no malicious files or links
• Mentioning COVID-19 and focusing on quarantines and the rapid spread of the pandemic in emails

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As the Coronavirus wrecks economic havoc and continues to force a change in behavior, malicious actors have jumped on the opportunity to steal people’s money and identity. Vigilance and education are the key to keeping these actors out.

[1] https://www.teiss.co.uk/hackers-impersonating-delivery-services/