Millennials the New Target of Tech Scams
Posted by: Timothy Weaver on 10/19/2016 10:36 AM [ Comments ]
Millennials are becoming a growing target for tech scammers. This is coming as a surprise to Microsoft and the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA).
A study carried out by Microsoft and the NCSA of 1,000 people around the world, found that not only is tech scams on the rise, but two out of three customers have been exposed to this type of fraud in the last 12 months.
It was thought that senior citizens were the most targeted, but the study has found that 17% were older than 55, 34% were between the ages of 36 and 54, and half of them were between the ages of 18 and 34.
Michael Kaiser, executive director at NCSA, says: "A lot of times we think of these scams as targeting older people, but there were a lot of millennials who responded to this scam."
Courtney Gregoire, senior attorney in Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit, says: "We think [the rise] is correlated to the shift in these fraudsters using more pop-up email and website misdirection online," she says of the increase in millennial targets. "Fraudsters are trying to convince victims something is wrong when nothing is, in fact, wrong," she continues. "At their core, they're using social engineering."
Have you been caught in a tech scam?
Source: Dark Reading
It was thought that senior citizens were the most targeted, but the study has found that 17% were older than 55, 34% were between the ages of 36 and 54, and half of them were between the ages of 18 and 34.
Michael Kaiser, executive director at NCSA, says: "A lot of times we think of these scams as targeting older people, but there were a lot of millennials who responded to this scam."
Courtney Gregoire, senior attorney in Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit, says: "We think [the rise] is correlated to the shift in these fraudsters using more pop-up email and website misdirection online," she says of the increase in millennial targets. "Fraudsters are trying to convince victims something is wrong when nothing is, in fact, wrong," she continues. "At their core, they're using social engineering."
Have you been caught in a tech scam?
Source: Dark Reading
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