Scams

Scam is a form of fraud that involves inducing trust in someone and then using that trust to extort money or personal information. The perpetrators of scams use increasingly sophisticated methods, often including the use of social engineering. Most often, the procedure involves mass-mailing in electronic form, direct telephone contact or various types of website solicitations. The basic types of scams using social engineering include grandparent and policeman scam, or scam using popular classifieds sites such as OLX or Vinted. The victim of a scammer is convinced that a policeman, clerk or bank employee is calling him and follows any instructions that are given to him, which ends up with the scammer obtaining personal information or passwords.

Among the varieties of scam can also be mentioned:

• phishing – extortion of data and other sensitive information. The acquired data is usually used to make a transfer, take out a loan or open a new bank account;
• spear phishing – a personalized email attack that involves sending messages to as many recipients as possible, targeting a pre-selected group;
• smishing – a scam based on a scammer sending messages containing links with malware, e.g. to fake websites or asking for a small surcharge on a courier or electricity bill;
• vishing – otherwise known as voice phishing. This type of scam does not require advanced IT knowledge and involves phishing during a phone call. The scammer may impersonate a representative of a public institution or a person known to the caller, e.g. an employee is called by a scammer pretending to be a superior or the president of a company and asking for access to specific information. An employee can be manipulated into a scam by using voice-altering tools.

There is a high rate of scam growth worldwide. A large part of it is carried out using mobile devices, and the attacks consist of attempts to seize login credentials for a bank or financial operator’s application. The largest increase in attacks has been registered in emerging markets, where digital transformation is progressing and e-banking is increasingly important and has more customers. To better illustrate the scale of the phenomenon in question, it should be noted that the value of extorted funds by criminals in hacking, phishing and other types of scam attacks amounted to hundreds of millions of dollars in the first half of 2023 alone.

In Poland, reports provided by banks show that the number and value of fraudulent card and credit transfer transactions are mainly examined, with card transactions dominating in terms of the number of frauds. If one compares the value of the money defrauded, transactions via credit transfer caused greater losses. In recent years, more than 85% of frauds involving card transactions have been carried out abroad.

The scope of services provided by our law firm:

• legal assistance in responding to fraud cases, including, among other things, contacting financial institutions, as well as assistance in reporting the incident via the website – CERT Poland’s computer incident response team;
• legal counseling to redress the damage caused by the crime, including the drafting of criminal notifications;
• representation of the victim in criminal proceedings both at the preparatory and judicial proceedings stage,
• support in ongoing contacts with law enforcement agencies and the judiciary;
• cooperation with expert witnesses in the field of information technology;
• conducting trainings.

Our offer is addressed to:

• persons victimized by scam;
• financial institutions;
• companies seeking criminal compliance specialists;
• experts seeking criminal legal expertise.