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Ready, set, scam: top-5 schemes cybercriminals are running amid the Olympic Games
July 2021 by Kaspersky
After an unprecedented year-long delay, the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics are set to start on July 23, 2021. This time, all the events will take place with no spectators, which reduces physical risks however in terms of health and from cybersecurity point of view sport enthusiasts must be vigilant of various online fraud schemes
Kaspersky experts analysed Olympic-related phishing websites designed to steal users’ credentials and found five key methods:
1. Live streams: Usually in such phishing pages, once a user enters their credentials, they might be redirected to a page that distributes different malicious files.
2. Fake tickets: Fraudsters are not shying away from trying well-tested (yet, somehow still effective) fraud attempts, like selling offline event tickets. Kaspersky experts also discovered pages offering refunds for already purchased tickets.
3. Olympic related entities: Kaspersky experts also found examples of phishing pages disguised as official Olympic ones such as a page pretending to be an official website for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and a page mimicking International Olympic Committee
4. Gifts: Phishing pages offering to win a TV, ideal to watch the Olympic Games on. This is quite popular and, usually, each user becomes a lucky winner and needs to pay the delivery cost however the TV never gets to the deceived user
5. Olympic games tokens: Kaspersky researchers found the first ever virtual currency, which is a support fund for Olympic athletes. A fake one. If a user buys the token, the scammers offer to support financially talented sportsmen around the world who are in need.
