Cybercrime continues to develop campaigns with which to steal information and money from users. Recently, the cybersecurity company ESET has warned about a new campaign in which criminals offer users a one-year subscription to HBO Max in exchange of 2 euros. The objective? rob the Internet user of about 50 euros a month.
«We check, once again, how these types of strategies are the order of the day and getting new victims even though they have been repeating themselves for quite some time. It is important to remind users to review any supposed bargain that they find on the Internet and to be suspicious of anything that is too good to be true if they do not want to find themselves paying more than they should,” explains Josep Albors, head of research and awareness of ESET.
As in so many other cases, the scam starts through an email in which criminals try to tempt the Internet user with an incredible offer. Nothing strange in this type of malicious campaign. The message, in which HBO is supplanted, is accompanied by a link that redirects the Internet user to a page that, in turn, poses as the official streaming service.
From 2 to 42.95 per month
Once on the fake page, the criminals ask the Internet user to make a simple survey to get the subscription to the platform for a reduced price. “This is a technique that we have seen repeatedly and that follows a pattern defined for a long time, but that continues to work very well among certain types of users, especially if the identity of the company that it serves as a hook”, says Albors.
Once this is done, the website invites the user to create an account and then make the presumed payment of 2 euros, which will not be such. As indicated by the cybersecurity company, at the bottom of the page there are “several sections related to a company that does not seem to have any relationship with HBO and that is in charge of carrying out this campaign.”
“In addition, we can also see in the small print how, in reality, we have subscribed to a service that we do notwill cost them 42.95 euros every 28 days and that does not even guarantee us the subscription to HBO Max for 2 euros, since only one in twenty participants will be graced with that promotion«, they remark from ESET.
To avoid an upset
As always, cybersecurity experts recommend distrust by system of all those emails, SMS or WhatsApp in which they try to tempt us with offers that are too good to be true.
The best thing that the Internet user can do in these cases to avoid the scam is to contact the company that, theoretically, makes the offer through one of its official channels. In this way, we will be able to clear up doubts about the veracity of the campaign without putting our data or our money at risk.