JOHANNESBURG – With the upcoming Black Friday sales period, cybercriminals are targeting customers of apparel e-commerce websites, including fashion, shoes, gifts, toys and jewelry.
Consumers looking for deals in these areas during the upcoming weeks are advised to be careful when making online purchases. These are the key findings of a Black Friday Alert 2019: Net Shopping Bag of Threats, prepared by Kaspersky experts, to evaluate what risks consumers may face during the holiday sales season.
Black Friday is arguably the most anticipated retail sales period in the world, when brands offer consumers the largest discounts and promotional offers. At the same time, cyber-fraudsters also consider this period fruitful, to lure people in to fraudulent schemes and steal their money.
To understand the extent of fraudsters’ activity, Kaspersky researchers analysed Black Friday threats, including the activities of botnets that distribute banking Trojans – malware aimed at stealing users’ credentials and financial data.
Botnets are networks of computers infected with malware. Depending on the will of the botnet owner, the malware may download additional malicious modules to use for other purposes. Using state of the art technology, Kaspersky tracks the activity of multiple botnets and is able to learn when a particular one is being changed and new abilities added.
Recently, Kaspersky researchers observed botnets made of computers infected with malware aimed at intercepting users’ credentials to gain access to leading e-commerce websites and subsequently (in some cases) bank card details, attached to user accounts in particular e-shops. Kaspersky found 15 malware families that were targeting a total of 91 consumer e-commerce sites and mobile apps across the world.
