Last year a total of 41 million euros in damage was reported to the Fraud Helpdesk, the organization that monitors online and telephone fraud. In 2019 it was only 26 million.
The Fraud Helpdesk notices that criminals are increasingly able to steal personal data, with which they can impersonate someone else.
An important reason is ‘phishing’, the sending of fake email with a link to a bank account. In reality, that link gives the scammer access to his victim’s personal information. The most common form of fraud is now the ‘request for help from a loved one via WhatsApp’: a phenomenon to which PlusOnline has also paid extensive attention. The number of reports of this increased fivefold last year, says Fraudehelpdesk.
There seems to be a connection with the corona crisis: since it broke out in March 2020, there has been a peak in the number of reports. Many more people have been shopping online since then, which of course widens the playing field. For a long time there was also a need for initially scarce and popular products such as mouth caps, disinfecting gel or sportswear. People who ordered such items never received them after payment, and the ‘supplier’ was nowhere to be reached.
Source: Security.nl