Major events such as the Euro 2016 represent a great opportunity for criminal organizations. In conjunction with international football tournaments such as the World Cup and the European Championship, traditionally security experts observe a spike in spammer activities.
The Euro 2016 will be held in June in France, and online fraudsters started launching spam campaigns that rely on fake notifications about lottery wins dedicated to the upcoming football tournament.
Security experts from Kaspersky are warning Internet users about malicious spam campaign spreading messages containing attachments adorned with graphic elements including logos of the next Euro 2016 and its sponsors.
“The contents of the attachments are the standard stuff: the lottery was held by an authorized organization, the recipient’s address was randomly selected from a large number of email addresses, and in order to claim your prize you have to reply to the email and provide some personal information.” reads a blog post published by Kaspersky in SecureList.”We have recorded cases where the same attachment was sent in messages with a different text, but the theme of the email is essentially the same.”
The experts noticed that crooks behind the spam campaign used multiple email addresses and different addresses in the body of the message. Kaspersky also observed advertising spam in different languages asking targeted people to buy a 2-euro commemorative coin.
The experts expect to see a significant growth in Euro 2016 themed spam in the next weeks, and unfortunately, this kind of attacks could be very effective.
“This type of fraudulent spam can be one of the most dangerous for users: the perpetrators are unlikely to limit their activity to fake lotteries, and will start spreading various emails offering the chance to win tickets to the games, as was the case before the World Cup in Brazil. The amount of spam targeting users in France, which is hosting the championship, may also increase.” continues the post.
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(Security Affairs – Euro 2016, spam)
