Malicious people print QR Codes that link to fraudulent sites to steal your identifiers and/or your banking details. We then talk about quishing! All techniques combined, the number of phishing attempts every day worldwide is estimated at 2.4 billion.
Do not scan unknown QR codes and always be vigilant! This is the lesson that must be learned from this new danger which threatens your personal data, according to an article dedicated to the columns of What to choose.
Indeed, to steal your identifiers and/or your banking details, Malicious people print QR Codes that link to fraudulent sites and stick them randomly in the streets or send them by email. In the same way that you are invited to open an attachment or click on a link slipped into an SMS, scanning the QR Code traps you and sends you back to an unpaid fine for bad parking or a misleading interlocutor who pretends to be for a banking advisor.
Cybersecurity experts call this new form of scam quishing (a contraction of QR code and phishing) and warn that this method of distribution, when carried out by email and SMS, passes antispam filters. A QR code can be generated very easily by anyone. There are indeed many free generators accessible in two clicks on the Internet; it is then easy to integrate the fraudulent QR code into a company-branded communication. Fortunately, platforms that offer free QR codes most often limit the number of possible scans of the QR code one hundred. This restriction contains the threat, writes QueChoisir.
ING Bank customers stolen by QR Code
Among the companies whose identity is often stolen is ING Bank, which left the French market at the start of the year and which allows its customers to identify themselves using a QR code. Customers of the Dutch bank saw their bank accounts emptied of several thousand euros following a scam.
Nevertheless, this type of misappropriation is increasingly complex. A QR code contains multiple encodings, with a redundancy of the different modules that is difficult to decipher, says Vincent Biret, CEO of Unitag, one of the large QR code platforms, which lists 1500 frauds for 25 million QR Codes generated.
All techniques combined, the number of phishing attempts every day worldwide is estimated at 2.4 billion.