Kaspersky security company has discovered a new fraud trick. Criminals try to convince their victims that they are entitled to compensation for leaked data. For that, you first have to pay.
The scam concerns a website that is supposedly owned by the Personal Data Protection Fund, established by the US Trading Commission. This fund promises compensation to people who may have fallen victim to a hack where data has been leaked.
The allowance is available to residents from all countries of the world, but to receive the money, the scammers demand that a temporary US social security number be purchased.
That costs the unsuspecting victim about nine dollars. According to Kaspersky, people have already been duped in Russia, Algeria, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates, among others.
The fake site in question gives users the option to check whether their personal data has ever ended up on the street due to a data breach.
To do this, they must enter their last name, first name, telephone number and social media accounts.
A warning will then always appear that data has indeed been leaked, such as photos, videos or contact details. The promised compensation runs in the thousands of dollars.