Seoul, South Korea - the Korea Communications Commission (KCC) has issued a nationwide alert regarding malicious spam texts exploiting the upcoming second round of People’s Life Recovery Consumption Coupon payments. These texts lure recipients with the promise of coupons but contain links to fraudulent websites designed to steal personal and financial information.
The KCC advises citizens not to click on any URLs included in unsolicited text messages, even if they appear to relate to government programs. Accessing these fake sites can result in the installation of malware that compromises personal data, enables unauthorized remittances, and even allows remote control of mobile phones.The KCC is collaborating with SK telecom, KT, LG Uplus, and Kakao to combat the illegal spam. They have also requested enhanced clever spam filtering from Samsung Electronics.
To verify the legitimacy of a message, users can copy and paste the text into the KakaoTalk “Protection Country” channel.
Reported illegal spam can be submitted to the Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA) via their reporting app or through mobile phone simple reporting features. KISA, working with telecommunications operators and manufacturers like Samsung Electronics, immediately addresses confirmed threats and shares data with the National Police Agency and the Financial Services Commission to prevent financial fraud, including phishing and smishing.
