It’s that time of year again – the holidays are here, and everywhere you turn, you see the hustle and bustle of consumers eagerly (or desperately) searching for the perfect gifts to put under the tree. Unfortunately, the holiday season isn’t just for shoppers; it’s also prime time for financial fraudsters looking to conduct holiday season fraud. According to a 2020 survey by Experian, one in every four U.S. consumers reported they fell for a fraud scheme during the holidays.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), the government’s telecom authority, would implement a caller identification system similar to other caller ID applications on the app store within the next three weeks. The new system will employ KYC verification to guarantee that callers’ identities are real and aren’t forged with synthetic identities.

Since 2018, identity fraud rates have risen by up to 15% year on year throughout November and December, as criminals try to take advantage of an increase in online transactions, lowering businesses’ capacity to investigate suspected fraud and access credit using stolen personal information. The issue grows more acute around the holiday season, with incidents increasing over the previous four years to attempt to obtain credit using stolen personal information.

The 2022 holiday shopping season is here. Retailers’ discounts are kicking off early, and shoppers are eager to spend, especially with big price markdowns to come as the season progresses. And with the COVID-19 pandemic still a concern to shoppers, more people are expected to shop online this season. What this also means is that as consumers whip themselves into a shopping frenzy, cybercriminals have activated their seasonal scams to try and steal money or personal information.

Researchers at Lookout Threat Lab have discovered close to 300 mobile loan applications on Google Play and the Apple App Store that exhibit predatory behavior such as exfiltrating excessive user data from mobile devices and harassing borrowers for repayment. These apps, which were found in Southeast Asian and African countries, as well as India, Colombia, and Mexico, purportedly offer quick, fully-digital loan approvals with reasonable loan terms.

UK police are texting 70,000 people who they believe have fallen victim to a worldwide scam that saw fraudsters steal at least £50 million from bank accounts. 200,000 people in the UK, including the elderly and disabled, are thought to have been targeted by conmen who masqueraded as highstreet banks.

Over 60% of the world’s population relies on technology to navigate their daily lives — that’s over 5 billion people! Unfortunately, with such a large audience online, bad actors have turned to technology to deploy scams and make a profit. Scammers use an array of channels to target people with phishing and social engineering scams that appear real, in order to trick them into handing over valuable personal information.

Identity fraud is the unauthorised use of a person’s personal information by another person to commit a crime or deceive or defraud that person or a third party in order to take advantage of the pleasures that come with that synthetic identity. The majority of identity fraud is performed for financial gains, such as gaining access to a victim’s credit card, bank accounts, or loan accounts.