I was just subjected to the most credible phishing attempt I’ve experienced

- The caller spoofed the phone number of the bank. The bank was not in my contacts, so I did not notice. Someone else in the thread noted that they did have the bank's phone number stored, which upped the credibility of the call to them.

- The caller called me twice in rapid succession (First ignore the call from a number you do not know. Then they call back again immediately: "maybe this is urgent / important"). Another person in the thread, who fell for the scam, noted this same pattern.

- It is better if banks include a security warning / specific reason the code is sent with the password reset pins and similar credentials. My bank did not. Another twitter user noted being subject to the scam, and just glancing over the warning copy. So it helps, but it is not perfect. Especially pre-coffee.

- My bank no longer allows me to reset my password without calling them (thanks bank).

When I read the thread now, it's obviously full of red flags. I was successfully manipulated, and whilst I'm certainly not as clever as all the people pointing out they would have caught this from sentence one, I believe I'm also not the lowest hanging fruit in terms of a target :-) Makes you wonder what this will look like when these scams evolve another couple of generations in terms of complexity ...

Me: Here is what happened to me, I'd like to file a police report.

Police: Well, with these internet scams, the fraudster is usually in another country, meaning we can't really do anything about it.

Me: They used perfect German, used information that I only ever provided into a non-public database of a German-based business that must have had a breach of some sort. The fraudster also used pictures of apartments in Germany that must have been taken here.

Police: Well, still. The person actually doing all of that could have been doing all of that from another country. Usually Russia or China or something.

Me [thinking to myself]: Yeah, Russia, or China, or some country where law enforcement generally presumes, even against all evidence, that any and all cybercrime is happening outside their jurisdiction and therefore not doing any law enforcement at all when it comes to cybercrime. Like what is happening right here right now.

Me: Well, I realize that nobody is going to start an investigation into this specific thing that happened here, but still: Isn't anyone at least compiling a database so that, once patterns become bigger and more apparent, an investigation of sorts may become warranted, etc?

Police: Nope. Nobody doing that. You can file a report. But I can tell you right now that nobody is going to look at it or do anything with it. Also, we kind of have more important things to do, here at the station. I mean: It's your choice. I can't stop you. Just telling you how it is.

Me: Okay, thank you, goodbye.

My parents have taken their precautions against phishing to extreme levels. They don't speak into the phone when unknown numbers call. At all. If they choose to answer, they wait for someone on the other end to talk and then decide whether to speak or hang up. They have heard horror stories of people getting their voices recorded and replayed into automated systems, so if someone calls and asks, "Hi, Is this <name>?", they avoid even saying "Yes", and instead ask who is calling. It may be paranoia, but as the saying goes... just because you are paranoid doesn't mean that they are not out to get you.

I guess one thing that could have mitigated this quicker is if the text from the bank had said "Here is the code you requested to reset your online password" instead of a generic "Your authorisation code is..."

My Gmail account has 2FA. The token is only used for login. If anyone asks me for it over the phone, there's only one reason.

Banks use 2FA sometimes at login, sometimes over the phone, and sometimes to authorize transactions. That should be made transparent in the message, but it usually isn't.

Imagine: "Your temporary pin for identity verification is 373123, and expires in 5 minutes."

"Your temporary pin to authorize a transfer for an amount ending in $xxx4.23 is 522185 and expires in 5 minutes."

I tried to call the number back from my phone (it was seemingly a regular local phone number in the LA area and I love fucking with scammers) and an automated response told me that “no Rover account could be found for my number, please visit Rover.com/help for more” which I thought was very sophisticated of them to really try and prove authenticity.

So then we called it back, from her phone, and it connected right away. The person on the other end said, “Ashley?” and I responded (in my non-female voice, not that there aren’t many men named Ashley) “yes, hello, how are you?” - they hung up immediately.

Ultimately my wife called Rover via their 1-800 number and it was indeed a scam. People try to ascertain your login creds to redirect funds. Basic stuff... but I was impressed at whatever basic twilio system was built to try and mask the scamminess with that automated message.

Couple days later two FBI agents show up in my driveway asking why I didn't respond to their voicemail..

1. Phishers call someone and pretend to be from their bank. If they've guessed the right bank and the person gives away their details, they win!

2. If they don't, and question the phishers authenticity, the scammers say "sure, just call us on the number on the back of your card".

3. The cardholder hangs up, and then dials the number for their bank, which they know and trust, because they've called it before or it's come from their card.

4. They get connected to a service representative, answer security questions, confirm that the transactions are valid, and then can relax.

5. A few days later, they get a call from their bank saying there's a whole lot of fraud on the account.

The trick to this one is that the phishers (a) call the cardholder on a landline and (b) when the cardholder thinks they've hung up, they haven't - the phishers just play a hook tone and then a dial tone.

In Australia at least (not sure about elsewhere?) if you call a landline number, the caller must end the call, or at least it used to be that way (I haven't owned a landline phone for a _long_ time. There's probably also a significant skew towards the elderly in landline owners, and in susceptibility to scam calls.

The banks here in the Netherland all have (well, except for one maybe) hardware authentication devices. They are portable smartcard readers, you insert your card, enter your PIN on the device itself (not your computer or phone) and transfer a digest from your PC to the reader by typing or scanning a QR code (some readers have a little camera). You then type the signature into your computer or phone.

The readers for my bank even have a screen, that tells you what you are signing, like a login, or transfer of which amount to which bank account. Photo here [0].

The banks are very clear that they will never ask you to use the device over the phone. And that double confirmation by showing the sign action on the screen of the reader makes any form of phishing really hard.

IMO these smart card readers are the best compromise between convenience and security for banking.

[0] https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6c1NGHew1P8/VBqvTeqDQdI/AAAAAAAAf...

Here in scandiavia, we've had hardware tokens (or phone apps) to offer 2fa for ages. And you need a new token for every transaction. In addition to the password for logging in. When you reset your password, you get an email and an SMS saying that your password was reset.

Last time I needed a new token issuer dongle, I had to actually visit the bank and sign stuff.

  Don't EVER communicate the following verification number to anyone, including <bank> collaborators: 123456

But that's a great heads up. Phishing is not just about obviously fake e-mails to hotmail accounts.

For example, your real bank in the U.K. ask for your date of birth and address for ‘data protection purposes’ when they call you, or they won’t even tell you what the call is about.

How are people supposed to understand what is OK to give out and what isn’t when these details, often used as security questions are somehow fine?

> Me: <gives member number> (that number, by itself, is useless).

and

> Once I gave my member number, the attacker used the password reset flow to trigger a text message from the bank. > They used this to gain access to the account.

What happened here? How does an exposed useless member number trigger a password reset? Would the reset request not have come to an email account, presumably a well-protected one?

Ideally the pins are also in different formats, so your normal PIN to login is a 6 digit number, the password reset is a 12 digit alphanumeric.

When I first started using web based communication platforms like Twitter and Nexmo I was really surprised to learn that I could put anything in the from field when sending a text message. All I could think was that it was a weakness that was ripe for abuse.

I believe there was a case in Germany a few years back where a group of phishers had online banking login details for several hundred users but couldn't initiate transfers without entering a PIN sent to the account holders phone via SMS. So the phishers set up a fake telephone company so that they could issue SS7 commands and have the account holders phone's temporarily redirected to another number where the PIN could be intercepted.

I think there is a false assumption amongst many people that the telephone system is inherently secure. Stuff like the above and all the robo calls coming from false numbers should warn otherwise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payment_Services_Directive#Rev...

That carries with it the requirement of SCA:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strong_customer_authentication

In practice (here in Italy) you have a client number (secret) a password/PIN (also secret) AND either a SMS to your mobile with a one time code or a Smartphone app (yikes!), there used to be hardware tokens generating one time authorization codes that have now been retired.

From mine (french big bank), they could be annoying (asking the bank to close accounts, ordering new checkbooks, getting all kind of information on past transactions, wire money between my accounts), but I can't see how one would effectively leverage that.

I mean, an attacker goal would be to draw money in some way; all money wirings to external bank accounts are protected by a code (SMS or in-app verification), with a 24h delay between the time one enters a destination account and the actual wiring.

Is that any different with other banks? Is an attacker able to effectively draw money as soon as they get access to the account?

A better sms password reset flow would be to first send a text asking "A password reset has been initiated. Was this you? Reply: YES or NO". Then after a YES confirmation they send the reset code along with the same big "Don't share with anyone on the phone" message.

E.g., the Monzo app has a chat functionality built in. If, upon a fraud attempt, a notification appeared in the Monzo app, it would certainly be legitimate.

If the ease of conversation offered by chatting with voice is necessary, add a link in the chat that has the user call the bank, not the other way around.

You can't easily verify that someone is who they say they are over the phone.

To verify he has the phone they just called him on?

You should never have to read back a verification code.

I have read about similar type of fraud. The scammers say that they are from the bank and they saw suspicious transaction and want to verify whether it was you, and try to get your card information and code from SMS.

- when you answer the call, stay completely silent: some systems will automatically hang up after a few seconds

- I never say the word "Yes" if I don't know the caller, so that they can't record it and use it in some scam contracts. Yes, vocal consent is a thing in some countries.

"Never answer your phone. Seriously. Only use it to make outbound calls. You cannot trust caller ID, and you should never answer unscheduled inbound calls."

Makes sense. Phone calls as they are can no longer be used for security verification. Just can't.

I almost always get text messages from numbers trying to scam me into receiving their check or giving them my G-Voice verification code.

I looked into the phone numbers that contacted me and it's difficult to find exactly who is trying to reach me.

A few things I learned:

- Apparently phone number spoofing has legitimate use cases so it is a "feature" that is do-able. I was asking different companies and they said for example: checking for domestic violence or checking on someone if they have a second spouse somehow.

- It is difficult to look-up online who is the caller and what mobile provider do they use.

- Some private companies have an internal database that contains the information. I asked one company and they told me what was the provider of the phone number.

- Spoofing makes it difficult to know where the actual call is coming from. Someone can use my mom's number to call me. It might be difficult for my phone provider to inspect the call further than what I would see on my phone already.

What I'd like:

- For T-Mobile not to forward to me calls that are known to be from fraudulous callers or thought to be from fraudulous callers.

- Know if T-Mobile can provide me with information on where the call is coming from.

- After I identify what company XYZ issued the phone number, or what company provided the telephone service to the fraudsters, ask them more information on the caller.

- Ask such company XYZ to stop routing these calls to me.

- Create a resource such that whenever there is a scam call coming in, we could send the number to such a resource, and discover what company BCD issued them a phone number and routed their call. I believe that once this company BCD knows about their fraudulent customers, it is supposed to not do business with them.

Hopefully with such steps, the situation should clear up over time.

ninja edit: we called and froze our credit immediately

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20777046

Many fun stories here: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=social+engineer...

It's not just the obvious "people can't abuse or lose data they don't have" why keeping your info to yourself protects you against abuse.

Even if you don’t fall for this trick sms is not secure and most providers don’t even bat an eye if a fraudster walks into one of their stores and requests a sim registered to your phone number.

Password reset is a difficult problem.

Never disclose your member number.

That said, all the banks I used send you along with the confirmation code a description of what you are actually confirming.

If it really is a serious situation, they'll just have to chill until I call back to a verified number.

As far as I'm aware, this will stop all attacks like this. Unless they've hacked the phone network and can reroute my calls? :)

"This is a verification code from [bank]. Enter online at prompt or in password field w/in 30 minutes."

Nowhere does it mention the purpose, or to NOT read the code over the phone under any circumstances.

> ~ Gets verification pin text from bank's regular number ~

> Me: <reads out the pin>

I think I'd be able to stop them and refuse at this step. But I suppose it depends on what sort of text shows up in the verification SMS message.

If they really suspect a fraud, they would block your account, and eventually ask for a meeting.

Scammers have been triggering password resets and 2factor to seem legit for long as it has existed.

He got in. Then did a few other useless operations during 15 minutes that required email confirmation which state what they are requiring it for. Those had mainly two purposes : help lower the guard and provide cover for the initial false requests. He kept smooth talking explaining that because of the various changes they should expect the bank app not be available and that everything was normal. Then he went for the option which allows to activate instantaneous bank transfers which required both email and phone verification code.

My relative was about to read it to them, when his wife smelling something fishy was happening put me with him on the phone. He was so convinced that everything was normal that I almost can't convinced him to hang up. What did the trick was telling him : "hang up and call back the bank before continuing".

My relative thought he was safe because he never gave the password of the bank app, nor the web password. But for our bank, this 4-digit pin password you put in the phone app is not a real password it is just a per-device off-line password you pick upon first device use to disallow someone stealing your phone to have access to your bank account too easily.

After he hang up, and I succeeded to talk some sense into him. I convinced him to call his bank. It was past 17h00, so it was closed. I told him to call emergency security which he did. But the number is typically used for lost credit card ; so they did the only thing that they usually do : revoke credit card and send a new one. Which is basically useless because the scammer wasn't about to use the credit card number to buy something online but he was initiating some wire transfer via the app.

So I had him call again a few times reexplaining the problem more precisely, or at least told them to block wire transfer for the account. Maybe it succeeded to raise some red flags, but they always told him that they couldn't do anything and that he needed to wait till Monday. From their point of view, you can be the impersonator so they didn't told us they did anything.

He also sent an email to the local bank manager during the night.

Stressful week-end lock-out of all bank accounts information goes by. The bank app is kind of deceitful because sometimes when it doesn't succeed in connecting shows you the last available data like it would in off-line mode and you think you are connected OK but you are not.

Monday they could reach the bank have the hack acknowledged and investigated ; access to accounts restored and password changed ; no harm done (except for the inconvenience of not having a credit card during the holiday, and info leaked) ; Luck.

Mitigation: password reset pins should say "this is your password reset pin".