Cybercrime always finds new and effective ways to violate network security and privacy protection systems in virtual contexts. One of these ways is spoofing or identity theft on the Internet, a method increasingly used by hackers around the world.
In this text, we tell you everything you need to know about it, in addition to providing recommendations so that you do not fall into this.
Spoofing is a practice and set of techniques applied to impersonate people or entities for malicious purposes, where personal or confidential information is obtained through deception. This is possible because the attacker creates a reliable facade to violate the victim’s data. Thus, they create a resource or medium that appears to be original and safe to steal data, whether banking data, or access codes, among others.
All in all, it is an increasingly common threat in the digital environment; In fact, spoofing has acquired various manifestations that expand its range of action. The consequences of impersonation go beyond the most common forms of fraud; It can even involve identity theft.
In the field of cybercrime, spoofing and phishing are commonly used methods in malicious hacking. However, although they are apparently the same, they differ in two fundamental aspects: tactics and objectives.
On the one hand, spoofing seeks to impersonate someone by falsifying phone numbers, emails, etc. On the other hand, phishing focuses on obtaining sensitive data through the creation of fake sites for fraudulent actions.
Thus, the first focuses on impersonating someone or something, while the second seeks to obtain information through deception.
As seen so far, spoofing or identity theft on the Internet operates by manipulating information to generate interaction with an apparently trustworthy source, so that victims fall into the trap and provide information such as passwords or card numbers. credit. But how does identity theft take place on the internet? Let’s see:
Although these are the most common methods, there are other more sophisticated ones that can even intercept the victim’s actions on the Internet to redirect them to fraudulent pages.
These are the main types of spoofing or identity theft on the Internet.
It involves the creation of false pages or websites that imitate, with a high level of precision, the originals, to deceive users. How does it work? On this fraudulent page, access spaces or forms are enabled in which victims can upload their data.
Email spoofing consists of falsifying email addresses so that, as with web spoofing, the victim believes that it comes from a real and trustworthy source. In this case, the email asks for sensitive information or encourages you to click on malicious links.
Attackers send text messages to request personal information or direct victims to fraudulent sites. Impersonation in this case is very common with regard to banks, state entities (eg Tax Agency ), postal services, among others.
This type of spoofing or identity theft is known as caller ID spoofing. What does it consist of? Attackers modify the telephone communication ID – or even the call number – to impersonate legitimate organizations or agencies. Whoever is on the other side of the line pretends to be a worker or official of such entities so that the victim provides their personal or banking information.
This impersonation involves using the victim’s IP to give access to networks blocked by firewalls or Fireworks. With this, data packets are sent from the intervened IP, which can lead to server overloads.
This spoofing, in simple terms, consists of manipulating the victim’s DNS records to redirect them to fraudulent websites. What happens with this type of impersonation? It is particularly dangerous because it can bypass encrypted connections.
There are several measures that can be taken to protect against different types of spoofing or identity theft on the Internet.
It is recommended to always verify the sender’s email address before replying or clicking on links. Following this, it is necessary to be wary of unexpected emails that request personal information or contain suspicious links. It is also important to verify phone numbers before providing personal information over the phone.
Scam emails or SMS often contain grammatical and spelling errors. If a message appears unusual or contains errors, it may be a spoofing attempt. Legitimate institutions generally communicate with formal, error-free language.
Implementing security measures such as two-factor authentication can add an extra layer of protection by making it difficult for attackers to attempt to access accounts even if they obtain the appropriate credentials.
Before entering sensitive information on a website, make sure the connection is secure. Look for the lock icon in the address bar and verify that the URL begins with https://. Depending on the browser, you may see a message similar to this: “The connection is secure.”
Software and operating systems must be permanently updated to protect against vulnerabilities that can be exploited in spoofing attacks. Developers of operating systems, software and applications (eg Microsoft or macOS) include security patches in each update.
This is one of the most important recommendations: create secure and unique keys for each account. This reduces the risk that attackers can access multiple services using the same password or discover it through brute force procedures.
It is also important to consider downloading software from official websites. This includes avoiding downloading attachments or software from unverified sources, as they may contain malware that will ultimately facilitate spoofing and other cyber attacks.