An 11-month joint operation conducted by Hong Kong police and Interpol disrupted a massive phishing campaign that used 563 bogus apps to steal financial and personal information from victims’ smartphones, South China Morning Post reported.
The operation dubbed “Operation Magicflame” targeted a cybercrime group that used SMS phishing to redirect victims to malware-ladden apps masqueraded as banks, financial institutions, media players, dating and camera apps. The campaign targeted people in various countries, mostly Japan and South Korea.
According to the report, the group operated 258 servers worldwide, with 192 of them located in Hong Kong. The servers were run by individuals in mainland China, the Philippines and Cambodia.
Once downloaded and installed on the victim’s device, the fake app would provide cyber criminals a way to steal data from the phone, including bank account and credit card details, phone contacts and photographs. The stolen information was then sent to attacker-controlled servers and later used to steal funds from the victim’s bank account.
Furthermore, hackers could read all text messages and emails, listen to audio recordings and track people’s locations, and could even turn on their victims’ smartphones to eavesdrop on conversations and take photographs secretly, the police said.
While no arrests were made in Hong Kong, the police identified some suspects and passed their information to related overseas law enforcement agencies through Interpol.
Earlier this week, European law enforcement agencies announced they shut down the Exclu encrypted messaging service, which had an estimated 3 000 users, including members of organized crime groups (OCGs).