Beware of scammers’ ‘social engineering skills’, warns BENEFIT Company

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Scammers are deploying the best social engineering skills to commit cybercrime and everyone using a digital wallet must be aware of this, said Ali Beshara, the Head of Information Security and Risk Management at The BENEFIT Company.

In an exclusive conversation with The Daily Tribune, the cybersecurity expert said BENEFIT and BenefitPay systems are very secure.

“Our security system adheres to international standards and local security standards like PCIDSS and PCI-TSP.

In addition to that, BENEFIT has a team of experts and we are investing in knowledge updates and building the technical capacity of the team,” Beshara said.

He attributed the rise in online fund transfer scams to a lack of alertness on the part of users.

“The BENEFIT Company has been issuing frequent awareness campaigns on its own and in collaboration with the banking and financial sector, Bahrain TV, Radio Bahrain as well as the General Directorate of Anti-Corruption, Economic and Electronic Security and participated in national awareness campaigns and collaborated with the Central Bank of Bahrain, the Ministry of Interior and Bahrain Association for Banks, in light of rising cases involving the hijacking of user accounts after sending fraudulent links randomly to people through SMS,” he said.

Beshara also pointed out that this kind of cybercrime involves ‘social engineering’ – a term used by information security professionals to describe the action from the part of hackers, who deploy their highest social engineering skills to get information, which is supposed to be kept secret, private and never shared, from their victims.

“It is in these situations, the hacker gets the password of the BenefitPay application and the OTP (One-Time Password), which is sent to the user in case of device change and money transfer.”

Beshara stressed that users are almost totally protected if they don’t click on links sent by fraudsters or share passwords with strangers.

He added that “neither BENEFIT nor banks will call you and ask for password or OTP by phone”.

“There are other types of frauds like calls claiming that the potential victim has won a prize from a bank and needs to update their CPR with BENEFIT or another company.

There have been similar attempts to hijack money changers applications.

Also, one should beware of fake advertisements on buying and selling websites,” he explained.

He said the bottom-line statement is “Don’t share your secret information with strangers and think before you act”.

Users of the BenefitPay app can find security tips on Instagram @alibeshara and the BENEFIT Company account @ benefit.bh.

Of late, more victims of online payment transfer scams have taken to the social media platforms to air their woes.

And, it is learnt that fraudsters have been targeting victims by making calls or sending SMSs.

The Daily Tribune carried a report about fraudsters targeting the online banking and financial transaction network in the Kingdom.

The published article carried the plight of one Bangladeshi national, one Pakistani national and an Indian businessman, who together lost nearly BD1,500 to the scammers.

Most of the victims have launched a complaint with the police department, pleading for an intense probe into the matter.

The Central Bank of Bahrain, many a time, has carried out campaigns and circulated messages alerting over the possibility of falling victims to online fraudsters.