From restaurant menus and shopping payments to online articles, QR codes have become a common sight in our daily lives. However, not all codes that you see are deemed safe as fraudsters have discovered a new method to steal your information and your hard-earned finances. This new scam is called Quishing.
Where does Quishing usually happen?
- On physical QR codes found in newspapers, flyers and in store standees
- From making payments through QR code scanning
- From scanning a QR code on your desktop or mobile
- From Quishing email sent to your inbox
How to protect yourself?
- Before you scan, check for any signs of tampering such as malicious stickers pasted over the original QR code
- Ensure the correct merchant's name is displayed before proceeding with your QR code transaction
- Check that the URL matches your intended destination, and avoid downloading suspicious apps unless verified as genuine
- Never scan QR codes from any unfamiliar senders, and check for signs like spelling mistakes in the sender's email address before scanning and clicking any links
Your instant messaging apps could make you a Quishing scam victim too.
- You launch the web version of your instant messaging app on your computer browser
- Instead of the real webpage, you ended up scanning a fake QR code on a similar-looking fake website instead
What happens next is the scammers can access your personal information and your account is compromised. Scammers can now use your identity to perform fraudulent activities.
Safeguard yourself from instant messaging scams by verifying the instant messaging app's web version URL before clicking on the top result in your search engine.
Don't let a QR scan bait you into a scammer's trap.
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