Public warned of alarming spike in financial scams via social media

The Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Readiness Team (Sri Lanka CERT) has issued a warning to the general public regarding a rise in frauds conducted via social media.

Over the past few weeks, there has been an increase in attempts to commit online and financial scams through social media platforms, Sri Lanka CERT reports.
Therefore, the public has been urged to exercise extreme caution when using social media.

Sri Lanka CERT highlights that cybercriminals are exploiting the upcoming festive season and current weather-related disaster conditions to take advantage of public trust and carry out fraudulent attempts to collect money.

The organization has received a significant number of complaints regarding individuals posing as government institutions, public departments, major retail stores, and business organizations.

Sri Lanka CERT noted that fraudsters lure people by posting false promotions, monetary rewards and prizes via social media.

Moreover, following damage caused by recent cyclones and heavy rainfall in several regions, cybercriminals have impersonated government agencies and organizations involved in relief and reconstruction efforts.

These individuals post fraudulent links to solicit donations, and it has been observed that some members of the public are being misled into transferring money, Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Readiness Team said.

As a result, unauthorized access to some bank accounts has occurred, and in some cases, individuals have lost money from their accounts due to these scams.

Accordingly, the public has been advised to avoid accessing suspicious links, share personal information only through secure channels, exercise extreme caution when visiting unknown or unverified websites and also not to disclose one-time passwords (OTPs) to any individual.

Sri Lanka CERT also emphasised that government institutions and recognized organizations will never request sensitive information through unsolicited social media messages or links.

During this period, any social media message requesting donations or financial contributions should be treated with heightened caution and the authenticity of such requests should be verified before taking any action, Sri Lanka CERT added.