QR Code Press

Top US energy company customers targeted in QR code phishing scam

08/21/202308/18/2023 Jorge Gonzalez

Over 1,000 emails were issued with security-related lures and containing malicious barcodes. Cyberattackers took aim at a major US energy company with emails including a malicious QR code and a massive phishing campaign seeking to obtain the recipient’s Microsoft credentials. The massive and highly misleading campaign was first discovered in May by Cofense. The email scam campaign used image attachments in PNG format as well as redirect links associated with well-known business applications such as Microsoft Bing, Salesforce and CloudFlare’s Web3 services. They included an embedded QR code that functioned…

QR code login scam threatens Discord user security

01/17/202001/14/2020 Julie Campbell

QR code login scam - Discord Login with QR Code on YouTube

The popular gaming messenger service has cautioned its users about the risk of pwned accounts. Discord has altered parts of its quick response code-based login system following reports of a QR code login scam. A number of the service’s users have warned that the previous version had suffered scammer abuse. The old system reportedly was being used by scammers attempting to gain user account access. Discord implemented changes to overcome prior vulnerabilities to the feature that was first launched in December. It didn’t take long before the strategy fell victim…

Bitcoin QR code generators are not as secure as some may think

09/05/201909/04/2019 Amanda Giasson

A report from ZenGo reveals there’s a lot of scam QR code generators for Bitcoin. A recent analysis conducted by ZenGo, a keyless Bitcoin and cryptocurrency wallet, reveals that four out of the top five Bitcoin QR code generators listed on Google’s front page are operated by scammers. The codes that are being generated link to the scammer’s own wallet. ZenGo discovered that when a user uses one of these malicious sites to create a quick response (QR) code for their personal Bitcoin address, the site generates a code for…

Scanning QR codes lets Chinese motorists pay to have stolen car mirrors returned in new scam

10/11/201710/09/2017 Stephanie Beck

Thieves demand cash by way of quick response code to give back stolen vehicle side mirror glass. Chinese thieves stole glass from car side mirrors, telling victims scanning QR codes to make a payment is the only way to have the property returned. The motorists were told to pay anywhere from $45 to $105 to have the glass from the mirrors returned. Police in Xian, a city in central China, are investigating reports of extortion efforts by local thieves. The criminals reportedly said scanning QR codes to pay were the…

QR code scammers captured by police, ending retail fraud scheme

07/14/201707/13/2017 L. Green

Law enforcement was finally able to catch up with two men who were conning a number of retailers with quick response codes. Police finally managed to capture two sneaky QR code scammers who had managed to con a number of retailers using fake quick response codes. The two men were able to scam over 20 different retail stores before being tracked down by law enforcement. The QR code scammers took their fake quick response codes to the series of different retailers and managed to scam them out of hundreds of…