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Fake Coronavirus Instructions from the White House
It was only a matter of time before COVID-19 scammers started impersonating the White House. In an email detected by Inky, digital fraudsters informed recipients that the IRS and the U.S. Department of the Treasury had decided to push Tax Day off until August 15, 2020. They then instructed users and businesses alike to click on a link in order to view the President's updated guidelines on the coronavirus.Image

Your Staff Is Infected with COVID-19!
In a roundup of new pandemic-themed ploys, Bitdefender found one ruse in which digital attackers claimed to be sharing a picture of the recipient's coronavirus-infected staff "per their request." The malicious actors used the disguise of a health adviser/laboratory technician from "Turish Hospital and Laboratories" to then inform the recipient that everyone else in the organization should place themselves into self-quarantine.Image

Introducing the Scammy "U.S. Emergency Grants Foundation"
Among all other age groups, seniors are especially worried about COVID-19. That's what makes this next scam especially horrendous. WNCT 9 reported that the Better Business Bureau (BBB) Scam Tracker learned of a ploy on Facebook in which malicious actors told seniors that they could receive funds to help to pay for their medical bills. Individuals who clicked on the link provided in this Facebook post found themselves redirected to a website for a phony organization called the "U.S. Emergency Grants Federation." This site requested that visitors provide their Social Security Numbers for the purpose of applying for funding. But seniors who fell for this scam received no financial assistance. Instead, they unknowingly gave attackers the means to steal their victims' identities and commit secondary attacks.This Is NOT a Legitimate Voucher Offer for Your Canceled Flight!
It's no surprise that digital fraudsters have begun to prey upon individuals whose' flights were canceled as a result of the coronavirus. Mimecast discovered one such ruse in which malicious actors used attack emails to offer fake flight refunds. The nefarious individuals specifically told recipients that they could collect a refund for their airline tickets by clicking on an embedded link.Image

IE Users, Beware of This COVID-19 Malvertising Campaign
Last but not least for this week, Avast revealed that it had spotted a new malvertising campaign. This operation capitalized on the fear surrounding the global COVID-19 outbreak to target Japanese and South Korean users in particular. As quoted in its research:On March 26, 2020, the bad actors behind the campaign registered the domain covid19onlineinfo[.]com, and have since rotated the domains the exploit kit is hosted on, registering about six domains a day in an attempt to evade antivirus detections.Using these domains, the malvertising operation attempted to exploit vulnerabilities in older versions of Internet Explorer. It did this in order to distribute Kpot v2.0, an information/password stealer. Have you seen a coronavirus-themed scam? If so, let us know by reaching out on Twitter.
Check out our other COVID-19 scam roundups below!
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – May 11, 2020
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – May 4, 2020
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – April 27, 2020
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – April 20, 2020
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – April 14, 2020
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – April 6, 2020
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – March 30, 2020
- COVID-19 Scam Roundup – Week of 3/16/20