Cybercriminals prepare for Amazon Prime Day: tips to avoid falling victim to phishing scams

July 11 (Portaltic/EP) –

This Tuesday, July 11, starts Amazon Prime Dayan event that will last 48 hours and in which the ‘e-commerce’ platform will make available to users new offers on all kinds of products, ranging from technology to fashion, including personal care, among other items .

This is an appointment marked on the calendar not only for buyers, but also for cybercriminals, who take advantage of mass purchases to carry out their corresponding malicious campaigns.

So much so that, according to Check Point data, while Amazon-related phishing campaigns have experienced a global increase of 8 percent, those related to Amazon Prime they have multiplied by 16 in the last month alone.

During this period, almost 1,500 new domains related to the term ‘Amazon’ were registered, of which 92 percent were found to be malicious or suspicious.

In addition, one in 68 new domains related to ‘Amazon’ was also related to ‘Amazon Prime’. About 93 percent of the latter were also at risk.

HOW TO IDENTIFY ‘PHISHING’ ATTEMPTS

The cybersecurity company has specified that these days different emails are being distributed with fraudulent links that direct users to fake web pages that they turn out to look the same as Amazon.

Hence, one of the most frequent attacks is ‘phishing’, which begins with sending an email or text message where the sender appears as ‘amazon.co.uk’. Once the victims have accessed, they are asked for their credit card number. By filling out this form, cybercriminals have free access to your data and bank accounts.

Therefore, to buy safely on Amazon Prime Day, Check Point advises taking other graphic errors into account, since these types of false pages usually have them because they They use machine translators.

It is also convenient to use a strong password for each service and that it is not easily deciphered. That is, it should have at least 12 characters, that uppercase, lowercase and numbers are combined and that obvious credentials are excludedsuch as birthdays or proper names.

Likewise, it is important, when buying ‘online’, to look for the symbol of secure connection encryption (SSL), that is, the padlock on the link, which is located on the left in the address bar.

Before proceeding with the purchase, and especially if it is ‘flash deals’, it is advisable to review what is being purchased and avoid impulse clicks. Finally, you should also spot bargains, since “if something sounds too good to be true, it probably isn’t,” according to Check Point.