Northumbria Police have warned about a PayPal-related cryptocurrency scam that is currently making rounds on the web.
The police force encourages all potential victims to contact Action Fraud, the UK's national scam reporting center.
The type of scam attached in the warning is anything but new. A victim receives a fake email about sending money to a cryptocurrency exchange. Luckily, there is still an option to cancel it, but this is where things get an unexpected turn.
Whoever falls for the sham and clicks on the cancellation link gets redirected to a spoofed version of the actual PayPal website that steals credit card information.
Alex DovbnyaIf you are not sure whether or not a certain website or email is legitimate, PayPal recommends contacting their security experts:
“Our security experts will examine the site and if it’s bogus, we’ll get it shut down. With this simple action, you'll be helping us keep our entire community safe.”
Notably, an uptick in cryptocurrency scams that involve PayPal came after the payments giant added its long-rumored digital service last month. As reported by U.Today, it is expected to be fully available for U.S. customers this December.
It is worth noting that PayPal has been plagued with crypto fraudsters since Bitcoin’s early day. In 2014, the company reportedly threatened to send debt collectors to one of its users whose account got compromised by Bitcoin hackers.
Vladislav Sopov
Dan Burgin