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If you live in Denmark and are tired of receiving bogus text messages saying you need to update account details for some service you’ve never used, or that a package you haven’t ordered has been held and you need to click a link to pick it up, you might be pleased to hear that the Danish Business Ministry has launched a set of measures against digital scams.
The measures include boosted information campaigns for people vulnerable to the scams, such as older demographics, including from banks who will send out information about power of attorney. This will allow next of kin to better check an older person’s bank payments.
READ ALSO: Foreigners in Denmark targeted by phone scammers
A limit of 50,000 kroner will be put on same-day bank transfers, while businesses will be given better power to protect their telephone numbers so the numbers cannot be cloned in ‘smishing’ scams.
These the SMS equivalent of ‘phishing’ whereby the victim is tricked into entering personal information into a false website through a message which is made to look it comes from a genuine organisation or business, such as the PostNord delivery service.
“Digital scams have got to a drastic level at this point and particularly affect vulnerable groups. I’m therefore pleased we’ve set these initiatives in motion to protect us,” Business Minister Morten Bødskov told broadcaster DR.
The Business Ministry has worked with the sector interest organisation for banks, Finans Danmark, along with consumer rights groups, the telecommunications sector and charity DanAge (Ældre Sagen) to minimise scams with the measures.
Statistics Denmark figures show that some 7,000 reports of data fraud were filed in the fourth quarter of 2022, DR writes. That represents a 49 percent increase compared to the preceding year.
Most of the measures will come into effect in early 2024.
An IT security expert said he would have like the measures to go further.
In comments to DR, Peter Kruse said that the links contained in the fake texts should be automatically blocked, so it is impossible for the recipient to click on them.
It should also be made impossible to send fake messages that appear to be from numbers belonging to businesses, instead of businesses having to actively protect their numbers, he said.
“It doesn’t do much good because the scammers quickly find a new number that works,” he said.
“The solution is modern solutions that block others from sending texts and calling from numbers that aren’t theirs,” he said.
Bødskov said that the ministry and its partners were already looking into additional measures against scammers.
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