Scam attack continues in Baltics, criminals use highly advanced technology - Debunk.org

VILNIUS – The scam and disinformation attack, which started at the beginning of the year, continues to spread in the Baltic States and criminals are using highly sophisticated technologies, Debunk.org, a disinformation analysis center, reported on Friday.

The center also points out that the authorities are not able to prevent the criminals' activities also due to the lack of cooperation from Meta, the company that runs the Facebook social network, which profits from the scammers' activities.

"We witnessed the highest intensity of the attack in September and October this year. We can see that active publicity, combined with action by the police and the authorities, has had an impact. However, scam attempts continue, albeit on a smaller scale," Viktoras Dauksas, the head of Debunk.org, said in a press release.

It has been found that online scammers use the names of various politicians, celebrities, companies and news portals, as well as high-profile events, to lure people into supposedly lucrative investments on platforms that do not actually exist, ultimately defrauding people of their money.

According to Dauksas, scammers use technologically advanced schemes for this attack. These include the so-called cloaking technology: this method makes detection of the scam even more challenging, as it involves creating many different websites or webpages and, depending on specific criteria, redirecting different users to different content.

For instance, potential victims are shown a fake website and a fake investment platform, while Meta moderators or researchers are redirected to completely unrelated real websites or their copies.

In addition, scammers automatically display content on fake websites in the language and on the topics of the user's country of origin.

Criminals also cover their tracks to avoid being caught, registering domains for fake websites through offshore companies in countries such as Panama, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and using a service that allows them to register domains anonymously.

Debunk.org estimates that at least 119 fake website addresses and 124 Facebook profiles have already been used by the criminals in this attack. These accounts have shown as many as 1,144 fake ads and reached an audience of almost 10 million users.