Police warn of phone scam

CYBERCRIME specialists are urging businesses and educational organisations to take security measures to protect themselves against telephone fraud.

An outbreak of cases in the country have prompted South Yorkshire Police officers to raise awareness of the threat and offer security advice.

Det Insp Steve Leach said: “Dial-through fraud occurs when hackers target an organisation’s telephone system and use it to make a high volume of calls to premium rate or overseas number, in order make a financial gain.

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“Once access is gained to a telephone system, the criminals can exploit in-built services such as voicemail, call forwarding and call diversion to direct calls to a number of their choosing.”

Suspects will often take a share of the money made by the calls or will be paid for their hacking services, but steps can be taken to protect your telephone system, such as:

•    Change your voicemail PIN or password if it is still set default

•    Use a strong PIN or password and ensure it is changed regularly

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•    Disable access to your voicemail system from outside lines. Voicemail is usually used for remote workers to access.

If it is not business critical, then disable it to ensure the access is restricted to essential users and they regularly update their PIN or password.

•    Consider asking your telecoms provider to place a restriction on your telephone line

•    Ask your provider not to permit outbound calls at times when your business is closed

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•    Ask your telecoms provider to alert you if there is any unusual call activity on your lines

•    Review your call logs for suspect traffic

•    Install a strong private branch exchange firewall and close down unused functions

•    Speak to your maintenance provider or the individual responsible for your Private Branch Exchange (PBX) to ensure they understand the threat to correct any security risk

•    Consider consulting an IT telecoms professional to ensure the settings for your PBX system are secure and the settings have been properly set up

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Research by the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau said the losses involved can be high, especially when accounts are hacked during holidays and weekends when premises are closed.

Det Insp Leach added: “Often, the fraudulent calls are not noticed until the telephone bill arrives, by which time it’s too late. 

“If you think your system may be a target, please do all you can to safeguard against hackers.”