The number of reported identity theft cases doubled in the last year after cybercriminals took advantage of people filling to receive government benefits.
The Federal Trade Commission reported during their “Identity Theft Awareness Week” that they received over 1.4 million reports of identity theft during 2020.
“Repeatedly, identity thieves targeted government funds earmarked to help people hard hit financially by the pandemic,”
Seena Gressin, an attorney with the Division of Consumer and Business Education at the FTC.
Last year, the U.S. government expanded unemployment benefits to people who lost their jobs due to the pandemic. Cybercriminals saw this as the perfect opportunity to file unemployment claims with other people’s personal information. There were almost 400,000 government benefits fraud reports in 2020, compared to 13,000 in 2019.
On another note, cybercriminals also targeted people trying to collect funds from government-sponsored small-business loan programs. The number of reported cases grew to almost 100,000 in 2020.
Bad actors also practiced these types of attacks to target stimulus checks paid out to the taxpayers.
Check the source.
Read More
- This Disney Plus Scam Is After Your Bank InfoA newly discovered Disney Plus scam is phishing for your banking information, using an e-mail with a very eye-catching […]
- ChatGPT Might Boost Phishing Scams In 2023, Experts WarnWhile AI’s immensely popular ChatGPT is a very useful tool for writers and creators worldwide, it might also help […]
- Devastating Ransomware Attack: Oakland Declares State of EmergencyIn the wake of a massive ransomware attack that left the city with no choice but to shut its […]
- H0lyGh0st Ransomware After Small and Midsize BusinessesMicrosoft has linked H0lyGh0st, a cyberthreat that emerged in June 2021 and targets small-to-midsized businesses, to North Korean state-sponsored […]
- Popular NFT Marketplace Ravaged by $540M Phishing SchemeIn March, a North Korean APT netted $540 million thanks to a massive phishing operation carried out on the […]
Attribution:
Photo by John Noonan on Unsplash
