Social Network Hacking......WARNING

[stonepecker]

To all the members,

If for some reason your cell phone starts acting weird.....all the numbers you call are busy......you can not text someone........Contact your carrier ASAP.

The way this happened.......we recieved (what we thought) was a text message from Verizon telling us that we had recieved a $60.00 credit towards our next months bill. Check out this site..........to find out how to recieve your credit.

The hacking happened when the wife went to the site. This allowed the hackers access to her account. Our phones are under her name.

They (the hackers) then proceeded to change our plan to international calling. Change the numbers from the phones we carry to smart phones. And then started calling Cuba, Vietnam, Mexico, etc....

We were lucky.......we will not be charged anything. We found out that our phones were not working and were into Verizon within 6 hours. At which gave the hackers time enough to make close to 100 calls.


Just wanted to share this as while we only lost our service for 8 hours...... we wouldn't want anyone else to have to deal with this problem if they don't have to.
Our account is now flagged that nothing is changed unless it comes from in the store we get our phones from......AND we only make changes in person.

Good luck all.

 

[Jim15]

Thanks Wayne.

 

[Monty]

Another great reason to avoid texting.

 

[ed4copies]

Well Wayne, in the words of the old saying,
If it wasn't for BAD luck, you wouldn't have ANY luck at all!!!

Glad this was a FREE one!!!

Ed

 

[Joe S.]

Another great reason to avoid texting.

Texting itself didn't cause the problem, it was the website.

 

[Monty]

Another great reason to avoid texting.

Texting itself didn't cause the problem, it was the website.

If you don't text, you would not have received the text about the credit in the first place. Did I mention I hate texting? I don't text at all. You want to tell me something ? Call me.

 

[SDB777]

Another great reason to avoid texting.

Texting itself didn't cause the problem, it was the website.

If you don't text, you would not have received the text about the credit in the first place. Did I mention I hate texting? I don't text at all. You want to tell me something ? Call me.

Ah, but if you didn't have a phone, you couldn't text.....one of those endless loops. To take it a step further, if you didn't have electricity you could charge the phone to receive the text to open the email to get hacked!



Stonepecker,

Another thought....why did your wife give information of a personal nature after getting to the website?

Just accessing a website will not give someone the information needed...that would have to be entered. Or has some new technology been made?





Scott (curiously awaiting my mindreading) B

 

[stonepecker]

The wife gave them nothing. The credit site had some kind of program that worked within our carriers system. It didn't have nothing to do with our phones. All she did was open the site to read how to recieve her $60 credit. After reading, she realized that our plan did not get the credit and deleted the window.
The program then kept the account open for the hackers to do what they needed to access our account.

Like I said....... the text looked just like others we have recieved from Verizon. Those were all real and part of the system. Verizon said we are not the first and won't be the last this happens to. They were surprised just how fast we caught on that we had been hacked. The store said most people wait 24 hours before thinking something is wrong and start checking into it.

I just wanted to give the members a heads-up incase it happens to them. Don't wait......if something is wrong, get it checked out right away. What the hackers are counting on is someone that doesn't use their cell phones daily. Like older couples that have them just for emergency or when they travel. The longer the time they have (the hackers) .......the more damage/ calls they can make.

 

[GaryMGg]

Not to pile on, but I'll use this opportunity to remind folks that hackers will use every opportunity to get into your system.
It's a multi-Billion $ industry!
Don't open email attachments from folks you don't know.
Scan attachments with current anti-virus software EVEN from folks you do know before opening it.
Hover over the URLs contained in messages--if it's different than what you see typed in the message, odds are decent it's malware.
Never provide PII to anyone who calls or emails asking for it.
And, remember, you didn't win the EU lottery, your BFF didn't get kidnapped and doesn't need your help, and IF it smells phisy, it is.

Finally, for those of you who don't know what it is yet, Google "Cryptolocker"

It's a jungle out here.

 

[edstreet]

Another great reason to avoid texting.

Texting itself didn't cause the problem, it was the website.

If you don't text, you would not have received the text about the credit in the first place. Did I mention I hate texting? I don't text at all. You want to tell me something ? Call me.

So what you are saying is the vehicle itself is responsible for the drunk driver. Truth of the matter is devious behavior will *STILL* happen regardless if the medium is there or not, in this case texting and vehicles. It will just happen via another outlet with what is available.

Blaming the object is all to ever growing problem in society and it is the downfall of society. Passing the buck, playing the blame game and other similar fallacies is often an ill fated attempt to remove responsibility and deny the truth. That truth is devious behavior is occurring.

Finally, for those of you who don't know what it is yet, Google "Cryptolocker"

It's a jungle out here.

Well said, cept it's not only a jungle it's a war zone.


----

Allow me to take it even further and say that no you do not need to place calls, text or the like to get scams like this. Many times you just need to be in a specific area. There are devices that will read cell phones with in physical range and able to decrypt a good bulk of things they send and receive.

This type of job that the OP mentioned I would view as a trivial attack. That is an attack where the information can be obtained in a very easy manner.

There are website, open to the public, that you can use (all of them are fee based mind you) On these databases I can put in my home address and see a list of everyone who has ever used this address, i.e. previous owners. The results includes spouses, children, parents, relative, age, phone numbers, social security numbers, place of employment and a whole slew of other information. Searches can also be based upon telephone number, last name and city, full name, partial name among other.

Most uses do no guard against trivial attacks and are totally unaware of how easy this information is to obtain. No I am not talking about using passwords and the like. Nor am I making reference to using 'online' services. I am referencing practice and procedures.

To prove this concept try this experiment. Next time you are in a checkout lane somewhere, look around you. There will be people who are flashing check books, cards and the like and the information on those are easy to read. Even easier if you have recording devices.