Situations of fraud, on the internet and face-to-face, and cyberattacks are once again in the news. The criminal police (PJ), military police (GNR) and the National Cybersecurity Centre (CNCS) are warning about these situations. ANACOM joins these entities in asking everyone to be attentive to the warnings of the authorities and to help in their disclosure through their network of contacts, so as to help to halt these situations and prevent the spreading of false information.
The most frequent situations are the phishing campaigns (by email, SMS or social networks) using the image of official entities, with contents allusive to the pandemic and directed at capturing personal data of their victims or infection of their devices with malicious software:
- Publicising of digital platforms or applications for mobile devices that appear to disclose information in real time about the pandemic (e.g., dynamic tables on contagion), but that really seek to infect the devices of the users with malicious software.
- Digital fraud schemes shared by email or via social networks, that disclose crowdsourcing initiatives for collection of donations for false campaigns for purchase of medical or personal protection material;
- Sending of false information, through SMS, namely that exceptional measures are being applied to combat COVID-19 and that all national citizens will be vaccinated, with guaranteed reimbursement of costs by the Government. For such, the user just has to pay a specific amount indicated in the SMS and the reimbursement will be made through the registration in the link that is sent.
- Swindling schemes, where people pretend to be health professionals or telecommunications operators so as to gain access to homes for fraudulent purposes.
Therefore, it is important that people should not install applications (apps) and software unless they have previously checked their authenticity, and that everyone should be watching out for contents that circulate on the social networks, so as not to be victims of fraudulent schemes and not contribute to the spreading of false information.
ANACOM also appeals to all consumers and users of communications services who need to contact these entities, the operators or ANACOM itself, about these or other issues, to use the digital channels and telephone lines. All the sector's entities indicate their telephone contacts and email addresses on their websites.
Should you need to submit a complaint, use the electronic complaints book https://www.livroreclamacoes.pt/inicio.
