Last year, the Economic Inspectorate received almost 47,000 reports of fraud and deception via Meldpunt, the online platform of the Federal Public Service Economy where consumers and companies can report misleading or unfair trade practices and receive information and advice to defend their interests.
The vast majority of fraud reports, more than four in ten, concerned false invoices, fake online sales sites and fraudulent investments (for example in crypto coins). More than a quarter of the reports concerned deceptive ‘recruitment practices’, such as customer solicitation by telephone or door-to-door sales.
There was a strong increase in the online sale of counterfeit products, especially via social networks, and the (re)sale of counterfeit tickets for concerts, festivals and sports matches.
Safeonweb.be
The Economic Inspectorate received fewer fraud reports in one category last year: those from consumers who fell victim to phishing attempts and suspicious e-mail messages. Not because there was less fraud to report, but because these types of victims are encouraged to send their reports to the mailbox of another government website: suspicious@safeonweb.be.
They did that en masse. An average of 27,000 suspicious messages are forwarded to safeonweb.be every day, accounting for around 10 million over the entire year of 2023. Cybersecurity experts were therefore able to neutralize 1.2 million suspicious phishing links.
Ukrainian girl
The use of QR codes to trap citizens is new. This technique is called ‘quishing’ (a portmanteau of QR code and phishing). Anyone who scans a fake QR code will end up on a fraudulent website where scammers try to steal your (bank) details.
Moreover, cyber criminals often use the same addresses or topics in their emails or social media messages to entice citizens. “Meet a Ukrainian girl today” was such an example last year, or “You have a package awaiting delivery. Use your code to track and receive it.” Government services are often used as a (fake) sender, in particular the Government Finance Department, the Pension Service or the Federal Police. The names of banking institutions and well-known e-commerce companies are also often misused by scammers.
Common sense
Recognizing scammers is not always easy. But a little common sense can help avoid a lot of disaster. For example: distrust emails sent at 1am; and know that a government email is never sent from a Gmail or Hotmail account.
Your alertness should not slacken, because the experts at safeonweb.be fear that phishing messages will become increasingly credible, especially due to the rise of all kinds of AI applications. Today, deepfakes can already be used to imitate voices and video images. It will become increasingly difficult to distinguish between fake and real messages.
