Clever looking text scam

[NDA]

I've just received a text from HSBC on my phone that looks pretty genuine. It looks genuine because there is no phone number behind the sender, simply 'HSBC' - I'm not sure how this can be done.

However, I'm posting up here (in the Lounge for a wider circulation) in the hope that no PH'er get's duped by it.

I know it's a scam as I don't have an HSBC account - if I did, it would be easy to be drawn in because it's come on my personal phone number.

[HJG]

Had the same the other day, as did a couole of friends. A few weeks ago I had a similar one but it was from "HSB C" . The space made that one much more obvious as a scam.

[Saleen836]

I get genuine text messages on my Barclays account showing current balance etc, in the past I have received scam texts which have piggy backed in on the genuine texts, no idea how they did it but I reported it to Barclays

[gothatway]

Surely anyone who clicks on that link deserves all they get ? Darwinism and all that.

[sc0tt]

gothatway said:

Surely anyone who clicks on that link deserves all they get ? Darwinism and all that.

Pretty much this.

[maxdb]

It's quite worringly easily done - the scammer buys bulk anomynous text messages from the internet where you can put the name or number it's from (can be any name or number you iwsh it to be from). Then just mass text a load of numbers with the dodgy links etc.

[_Exocet_]

I also had a similar text purportedly from Halifax, though my first thought wasn't that it was a clever looking scam - surely the vast majority of people would realise that no genuine company would ever send an IP address as a link?

Even if you're not familiar with computers, a row of numbers instead of a genuine looking name must ring alarm bells.

[Gavia]

The one I received was far better as below. The one involving my debit card being suspended was a fraudulent text, but my phone plonked it straight into the legitimate ones received from Barclays. That would be very easy to fall for. Barclays had no interest at all when I reported it to them. Their response was to tell me that it was fraudulent, completely ignoring the fact that that was exactly what I was reporting to them.

[sc0tt]

Gavia said:

The one I received was far better as below. The one involving my debit card being suspended was a fraudulent text, but my phone plonked it straight into the legitimate ones received from Barclays. That would be very easy to fall for. Barclays had no interest at all when I reported it to them. Their response was to tell me that it was fraudulent, completely ignoring the fact that that was exactly what I was reporting to them.

I find this half of the problem. They are quite happy to agree with you that it is fraudulent but have no bit of script to follow through with the fraudulent bit.

Useless.

[NDA]

Gavia said:

The one I received was far better as below. The one involving my debit card being suspended was a fraudulent text, but my phone plonked it straight into the legitimate ones received from Barclays. That would be very easy to fall for. Barclays had no interest at all when I reported it to them. Their response was to tell me that it was fraudulent, completely ignoring the fact that that was exactly what I was reporting to them.

That's pretty worrying.

We live on our smart phones today but I realise that PH'ers with their goatee beards and webby directorships would never get caught out.

[sc0tt]

NDA said:

That's pretty worrying.

We live on our smart phones today but I realise that PH'ers with their goatee beards and webby directorships would never get caught out.

Well I would "expect" less and less of regular smartphone users to get scammed. Of course they still do it because obviously they hit jackpot once in a while but knowledge spreads.

[NDA]

Yep - Sc0tt and Toxic, quite right. But it was the first text scam I had personally received and had it come from my bank (I'm not with HSBC) and been sorted by my phone into a genuine text trail (as highlighted above) I could have been fooled.

[gamefreaks]

The issue here (apart from scamming scumbags) is that it’s 2018 and we’re still using SMS.


AFAIK, SMS sent using a short code, your phone can’t tell the difference between legit SMS and those sent from a boiler room.


SMS is a ridiculous technology to be using in this day and age. I have no idea why it still hasn’t been replaced.

[Pothole]

gamefreaks said:

The issue here (apart from scamming scumbags) is that it’s 2018 and we’re still using SMS.


AFAIK, SMS sent using a short code, your phone can’t tell the difference between legit SMS and those sent from a boiler room.


SMS is a ridiculous technology to be using in this day and age. I have no idea why it still hasn’t been replaced.

Because it's cheap, ubiquitous and relatively safe.

[gamefreaks]

Pothole said:

Because it's cheap, ubiquitous and relatively safe.

They’re actually really expensive. An SMS will cost 2.5-4p per message.

For comparison, a push notification will cost around 50p per million. (First million free).

[Shakermaker]

sc0tt said:

Gavia said:

The one I received was far better as below. The one involving my debit card being suspended was a fraudulent text, but my phone plonked it straight into the legitimate ones received from Barclays. That would be very easy to fall for. Barclays had no interest at all when I reported it to them. Their response was to tell me that it was fraudulent, completely ignoring the fact that that was exactly what I was reporting to them.

I find this half of the problem. They are quite happy to agree with you that it is fraudulent but have no bit of script to follow through with the fraudulent bit.

Useless.

Indeed, and this is why the one from the OP will work well, if they target someone who happens to have an HSBC account, it will stream it together with their legitimate HSBC text messages

[captain_cynic]

gamefreaks said:

SMS is a ridiculous technology to be using in this day and age. I have no idea why it still hasn’t been replaced.

How is it a ridiculous technology?

And what would you replace it with.

SMS is still around because it isn't broken... and nothing else has come along that can do it's job better.

There are two communications technologies that need to go first.
1. Email... Email was designed in the 60's as a plain text messaging system, it was never designed to handle the kinds of communications it does now and we've been hacking bits onto it for decades to make up for its shortcomings (things like attachments, HTML email, SPF). The SMTP needs to be replaced in it's entirety.
2. Telephone. Particularly mobile services. For years now all phone communications have been digital, for decades it's been digitally switched. We need to let go of the concept of "minutes" and phone lines, particularly with mobile phones and embrace a VOIP future. This has more or less been done on landline phones but it's taking a while with mobiles, LTE was supposed to have gotten rid of this and moved to a VOIP (via data) model, but phone companies have kept it by forcing the call via the older HSPA network.

[captain_cynic]

gamefreaks said:

They’re actually really expensive. An SMS will cost 2.5-4p per message.

For comparison, a push notification will cost around 50p per million. (First million free).

SMS's cost nothing (well a very small fraction of a penny). The cost telco's assign to them is artificial. An SMS is already sent via data so unlike phones, there's no need to have dedicated routing hardware.

The pricing structure of mobile phones is completely artificial. Once the hardware is paid for, services are so cheap they're practically free. This is why you can get £10 monthly SIM's with unlimited minutes and texts.

The majority of what most people pay for is actually for the handset, not the service.

[NDA]

Shakermaker said:

Indeed, and this is why the one from the OP will work well, if they target someone who happens to have an HSBC account, it will stream it together with their legitimate HSBC text messages

Correct.

[Shakermaker]

NDA said:

Shakermaker said:

Indeed, and this is why the one from the OP will work well, if they target someone who happens to have an HSBC account, it will stream it together with their legitimate HSBC text messages

Correct.

And yet, my own iPhone still cannot work out how to stream messages from my wife into one thread despite the fact she only has one phone, one number, and one contact space in my phone book.