“Your package is on its way”: Virus Fraud

These days, the postal police of Trieste and the entire region receive numerous reports from concerned citizens, which contain information about the parcel that is supposed to be stored about receiving an SMS or tracking the ship.

The message has a link as the key to access important data on the smartphone: the text is more or less always the same, and refers to a package that comes in or in storage; The text invites the user to track the ship; Other times the text calls for “action within 48 hours”, otherwise the package in question will be returned to the sender; There is a strange connection with it, there are strange words and random numbers to create it; The connection does not have SSL certificate (it does not start with “https”, but with “http”).

what to do

The only way to protect yourself is to not click on the hyperlink in the text message “Your package is coming” altogether. The link takes you to a page that calls you to pay to open an incoming package: This is how hackers access users’ personal information.

To be more relaxed, you can block the sender: the message seems to have come from a different Italian number; However, it is not certain if the sender was rejected and blocked and the other could not come from another phone number. However, clicking on the link in question leads to the installation of so-called “St. Anthony’s chains”, through which the affected user automatically sends the same SMS to other numbers in the same address book. (And no).

It is advisable to click on the link received in the SMS: format the device (factory reset); To reject any message from that phone user to report their contacts in the address book; Change all the passwords used on the smartphone (social networks, emails, various apps but above all home banking). For any need or suspicion, you can access the Postal and Telecommunications Police Portal or contact the offices at the Commissariatotips.it site.