If you received an e-mail saying that someone screenshots your activities of browsing adult websites and trying to blackmail you, do not panic. This is neither ransomware nor controlled by a hacker, it’s a scam.
Recently we received a help request from our clients. Our clients said he/she was going to send Bitcoins to an address and ask if we can track down the address owner. Then he/she provided more details to us, with all the details he/she provided and Auth Lab told him/her no need to panic. This is a scam.
(The case has been authorized by our client.)
Actually, this kind of scam is happening out there. The scammer hacked the account information of the users and then used the email account to send a scam email to the users themselves.
The scammers are trying to convince the users to believe that they have been hacked and this email is sent from their own email accounts. They made up a whole process of how they hacked the user’s personal computer or other devices, convincing the users to believe that they have a screenshot video of themselves browsing adult content, and use it to blackmail cryptocurrency from users.
The security engineers of Auth Lab are here to remind our clients when you receive an email from yourself that says your personal device has been hacked(actually it’s not). Don’t panic, just change the password of your email account.
Here are some security behavior advice that could help in securing your email account:
- Double-check before you click any attached files or links.
- We suggest people have at least two email accounts,
- one is for personal use – that email will be only used for your personal contacts.
- And another one is for public use – the email should be used to register accounts and connect public infrastructures such as public Wifi.
- Use different passwords for different websites to avoid credential stuffing.