The Department of Justice’s Office of Cybercrime (DOJ-OOC) warned the public on Friday, February 19, against scams involving text messages that are purportedly sent by banks and other financial institutions.
The DOJ-OOC told the public in its social media advisory to look for “common red flags” that would show that the text messages they received could be scams.
The red flags include “grammatical errors in the text message, unregistered sender, and a link where you may allegedly report the incident,” it emphasized.
“If one of the foregoing (red flags) is present, it is safe to assume that the text message received is a scam,” it stressed.
It reminded the public that “the most prudent way to confirm the validity of the text message is by calling the banks' hotline numbers that are posted on their respective official websites.”
The DOJ-OCC issued the advisory after its attention was called on the modus being employed by scammers “through text messages to bait prospective victims into clicking a certain link that would direct the user to a phishing website.”
“The modus would involve receiving a text message from the victim's supposed banking institution during the wee hours of the night, informing the said victim about an OTP (one-time password) she or he requested,” it said.
“The text message further encourages the victim to go to a certain website by clicking the link embedded therein if he/she is not the one who allegedly requested for the OTP,” it said.
Another form of this scam is that “a text message from the victim's supposed banking institution during the wee hours of the night, informing the said victim that someone is transacting online using his/her bank account,” it said.
“Similarly, the text message encourages the victim to go to a certain website by clicking the link embedded therein if he/she is not the one who allegedly transacted online using his/her bank account,” it added.