Carinthian woman loses over 1,000 euros through toll fraud
A woman from Villach-Land was defrauded of more than 1,000 euros through a fake ASFINAG website after receiving an SMS about an alleged toll fee.
Carinthian woman loses over 1,000 euros through toll fraud
A resident of the Villach-Land district has become the victim of internet fraud, losing a four-figure sum in the process. The woman, who has not been named, decided to make her experience public in order to protect others from similar cases.
It all began with a text message directed at her daughter. At the time it was received, her daughter was outside Austria and was having difficulties with her credit card. The mother therefore took on the alleged payment obligation for a road toll of 8.60 euros.
She followed the hyperlink contained in the message and entered her financial details on the platform there. Instead of the expected small sum, a substantially higher amount – approximately 1,100 euros – was debited from her account. The transaction took place in Australian currency. She immediately had her card blocked. At her bank, she learned that the money had been transferred to an account in Spain. The return of the funds is questionable.
The defrauded woman reports that the internet presence of the fraudsters was visually hardly distinguishable from the real government website. She hopes that by providing her example, she can discourage others from clicking on such links.
Austria's cybercrime prosecution authority also warns on its website against this scheme. Fraudsters operate fake web shops that imitate the design of the official ASFINAG page. In doing so, they use manipulated addresses with spelling errors or exotic domain extensions.
Particularly risky are paid search results in internet search engines. Those looking for a daily vignette in the short term often click on the top advertisements – that is exactly where criminals place their traps. Entered data is misused for unlawful business or sold to third parties.
Experts urgently advise purchasing vignettes only through authorised distribution channels and carefully checking the internet address.
Source: Google News AT — Crime (de)