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Data analyzed by Atlas VPN reveals the scope of cyberfraud amid the COVID-19 pandemic, including over 300k new websites created in March with coronavirus-related keywords.
The novel Coronavirus continues to have dire impacts on the global economy, with unemployment claims in the U.S. alone surging by over 1,000% to 3.3M—and Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell saying today, "We may well be in a recession."
To further complicate the situation, cyber-profiteering is on the rise, with 22% of Americans claiming they have been the target of cyberfraud. Now, new data analyzed by Atlas VPN is shedding more light on the scope of this cybercrime.
According to the report, in Jan., Google registered 149k active phishing websites. In February, that number nearly doubled to 293k. In March, though, that number had increased to 522k—a 350% increase since January.
The daily increases during the month of March also offer insight into fraud. Data from a RiskIQ scan of websites with suspicious coronavirus-related keywords indicates that 317k new websites were created during the two-week period between Mar. 9-23.
Mar. 11 and Mar. 21 saw the steepest day-over-day increases, at 278% and 312%, respectively. Mar. 11 was the day the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic. Mar. 20 was the day when New York, Illinois, and Connecticut joined California and Pennsylvania in ordering some form of shutdown—offering insight into the surge on Mar. 21, which also saw the single greatest daily leap, with 67k new suspicious websites created.
While RiskIQ’s scan is only based on keyword search, ZDNet has been checking these sites at random, finding that roughly nine out of ten were in fact malicious or attempting to generate sales of fake supplements.
“I believe that hackers identified coronavirus as something users are desperate to find information on,” Atlas VPN COO Rachel Welch said in a statement. “Panic leads to irrational thinking and people forget the basics of cybersecurity. Users then download malicious files or try to purchase in-demand items from unsafe websites, in result becoming victims of scams.”
