Filenews 20 August 2021
Particular attention is advised to the public by the Police, since the form of fraud through malicious phone calls, which aims at accessing computers and citizens' bank accounts, continues.
Lately, the Police have been receiving several new complaints of telephone fraud, where deft, cybercriminals claim to be Microsoft officials from abroad and guide users in some actions that may lead to data or bank data being intercepted. The mode of action of the suspects is as follows:
- They make phone calls to subscribers in Cyprus and present themselves as engineers of the Microsoft Support Centre. They offer to help solve computer problems to remove allegedly malicious software (virus) or even to install special software for supposed data protection.
- To this end, they (a) request remote access to the computer and as a result they have ownership of the computer with all possible consequences that may arise, such as access to electronic data, bank accounts, passwords and other data or (b) they ask for numbers of bank cards or other data supposedly for inspection.
The public is urged to be particularly careful, not to respond to these calls and for citizens not to give their details to such callers.
