Rands and Sense - Personal Finance

According to The Harvard Business Review, as developing economies such as South Africa rush to go online, a fertile environment has been created for hackers to practice their skills. This is where they have the opportunity to evade detection rather than deploying their skills against a company or state which has more advanced defences.

More and more transactions are being conducted on-line and as a result, we are becoming increasingly exposed to cyber-attacks.  Cyber-criminals attack unsuspecting individuals in a variety of ways and these attacks are becoming ever more sophisticated and daring. 

It is almost impossible to insure yourself against this form of loss.  Institutions typically refer to the small print of the contract and more often than not repudiate any claim for compensation. 

Cyber-crime (often called hacking) involves any criminal act using computers and networks.  It includes crimes conducted through the internet, cyber extortion, ransomware, phishing, internet fraud, identity theft and credit card account theft.  Spear phishing employs messages that appear to be innocuous but contain dangerous malware. It is one of the most popular forms of cyber-attack, though it largely depends on the attackers’ ability to send a message which will fool a victim into opening a link or attachment.

There have recently been a number of cases in our local community where cyber-criminals have hacked into individual and corporate computer systems, then used sophisticated systems to monitor email conversations to intercept messages containing information such as payment instructions.  After they have identified an opportunity, they change banking details and proof of payment receipt documentation to dupe unsuspecting individuals into paying large sums of money into bank accounts to which they have access.  Recently, cell-phone users have received calls from criminals posing as fraud investigators employed by the large cell-phone companies and have been duped into parting with one-time-pin information.  Immediately thereafter, large amounts of data are fraudulently purchased through the cell-phone user’s account. In most cases, the person being de-frauded will unfortunately not been able to recover any of the money that has been stolen, despite reporting the matter to the SAPS and the institutions involved. 

Never respond to an unsolicited related email or SMS and never confirm a one-time pin number over the phone; never provide any information about your personal details in response to unsolicited telephone calls.  Also, never open an attachment in an email without first verifying the authenticity of the sender.

Finally, always make sure that your antivirus software is up-to-date and back-up your data on a regular basis.  Education, sound judgment and a healthy dose of scepticism are our best defences against becoming a victim of cyber-theft.  If an opportunity sounds too good to be true, it usually is!

Rands and Sense is a monthly column, written by Ross Marriner, a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER® with PSG Wealth.

His Financial Planning Office number is 046 622 2891