CERT warns against phishing gangs sending out corona test mails

Chennai

“Malicious gangs are planning large scale phishing attacks on individuals and business firms,” CERT-India warned on its Twitter handle. These emails will reach you under the pretext of local authorities in charge of dispensing government funded COVID-19 support initiatives, the communication said, and added that such mails have been designed to lure recipients towards fake websites where one will be deceived to download malicious files besides entering personal and financial data.

According to the agency, the fishing gangs have obtained more than 2 million e-mail IDs and are planning to send them across with the subject: Free COVID testing. Apart from Chennai, residents of Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Ahmadabad are also expected to be targeted by the gang which is supposed to start sending mails from Sunday. The gang is also expected fake government agencies’ email IDs such as ncov2019@gov.in to send out mails. As part of its warning for netizens, CERT-India has asked public not to open links of unsolicited mails. “Exercise caution when opening attachments if the sender appears to be genuine. Scan and remove suspicious attachments and beware of mails that offer you rewards, cash prizes and so on. Any suspicious activity on your mail should be immediately reported to incident@cert-in.org.in with relevant details of the sender for taking appropriate action,” the agency has appealed.