The FBI warns the public about criminals targeting US stock investors through social media platforms and messaging service applications (apps). The scheme, known as a “ramp-and-dump” stock manipulation, targets US investors through online engagement, often via social media advertisements or messages promoting an “investment club” of fellow investors, some of which may be bots or fake accounts.
These promotions typically direct victims to secure messaging apps where the group operates. To appear credible, perpetrators may impersonate legitimate brokerage firms or well-known stock analysts. They secretly control a large volume of a low-priced stock and coordinate efforts to inflate its price (“ramp up”) by encouraging investment club members to purchase shares over a period of several weeks or months. Once the price is artificially elevated, the criminals sell off (“dump”) their shares at a profit, leaving unsuspecting investors with significant losses as the stock value collapses.
Read more…
Source: U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation Cyber Division
Sign up for the Cyber Security Review Newsletter
The latest news and insights delivered right to your inbox.
Related:
- San Francisco cops can use private cameras to live-monitor ‘significant events’
September 21, 2022
San Francisco police are now set to use non-city-owned video cameras for real-time surveillance under a rule approved by the Board of Supervisors. The controversial policy allows the US West Coast city’s cops to use privately owned surveillance cameras and camera networks to conduct investigations as well as to live monitor “significant events with public safety ...
- Pentagon opens sweeping review of clandestine psychological operations
September 19, 2022
The Pentagon has ordered a sweeping audit of how it conducts clandestine information warfare after major social media companies identified and took offline fake accounts suspected of being run by the U.S. military in violation of the platforms’ rules. Colin Kahl, the undersecretary of defense for policy, last week instructed the military commands that engage in ...
- New York ambulance service discloses data breach after ransomware attack
September 17, 2022
Empress EMS (Emergency Medical Services), a New York-based emergency response and ambulance service provider, has disclosed a data breach that exposed customer information. According to the notification, the company suffered a ransomware attack on July 14, 2022. An investigation into the incident revealed that the intruder had gained access to Empress EMS’ systems on May 26, 2022. ...
- US senator reveals how US Customs has amassed data from Americans’ devices
September 15, 2022
Every year, thousands of Americans have their phones and other devices searched at the border before they travel abroad. Now, a US senator has revealed that when it searches these devices, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) downloads their contents — which can include text messages, pictures, and other personal information — into a massive ...
- Ransomware gang threatens 1m-plus medical record leak
September 14, 2022
Two recent ransomware attacks against healthcare systems indicate cybercriminals continue to put medical clinics and hospitals firmly in their crosshairs. Daixin Team has taken credit for a September 1 assault on Texas-based OakBend Medical Center, causing a shutdown of the organization’s communication and IT systems as well as exfiltrating internal data. The criminals claim to have stolen ...
- FBI: Cyber Criminals Targeting Healthcare Payment Processors, Costing Victims Millions in Losses
September 14, 2022
The FBI has received multiple reports of cyber criminals increasingly targeting healthcare payment processors to redirect victim payments. In each of these reports, unknown cyber criminals used employees’ publicly-available Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and social engineering techniques to impersonate victims and obtain access to files, healthcare portals, payment information, and websites. In one case, the attacker ...