Bank Scam Creates Fake Website

Scammers are stealing money without a trace

To the high tech world of scam artists we are nothing more than a name, a number and a bank account.  That's why there has been a shift of criminal activity from the real world to the cyber world.

And that cyber world is a great hiding place when crooks get into our online bank accounts, and that's the prize these days.   

The ability to draw money out of your bank account without you knowing is probably more of an advantage than stealing your credit card, according to Stephen Cobb from ESET Cyber Security.

So how are they doing it? 

Cobb said scammers are sneaking SpyEye Trojan Horse viruses onto our computers and then stealing our banking account user names and passwords, but that's not all, once they take our money, they're hiding their tracks.

"We've all seen movies where the bad guys trick the surveillance camera into seeing something that's not there; this is how the web browser works when the mad guys have taken it over," said Cobb.

In other words, the scam artists create a fake page that looks like your bank account but hides the fact that they stolen your money.  So if it's a Bank of America or Chase account the scam artists create a look alike page that tricks the owner into thinking nothing is wrong.

"You don't see their fraudulent transactions," said Cobb.

The easiest way to fight the scam is to have a virus protection on your computer and to keep it up-to-date.  Regular scanning of your system should remove the offending software.

There is another important point to all this, that while the bad guys will create a fake bank page, it  only works on the computer you used to access your account. 

If  you check your account on your ATM or on your smart phone or on a different computer  the real account information will show up. But by that time... it might be too late.

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