Tillmann Prüfer is a member of the editor-in-chief of “Zeit-Magazin”.
The other day I got an email, apparently from my employer, that something was wrong with my payslip. They accidentally transferred too much money to me and will keep the amount on the next bill. Attached is an Excel file with the new salary figures.
I was immediately angry, also because the email was worded very casually, as if it were quite normal for people to mess around with my salary transfer. No word of apology. I clicked on the supposed file.
Instead of a spreadsheet, my employer’s page opened, telling me that I had fallen for a mock phishing attack. In the future, I should never open any more file attachments that didn’t seem 100 percent trustworthy to me. I was amazed at how quickly it became plausible to me that there had been chaos in my salary transfer. After all, I had successfully ignored several other phishing attacks before.
Phishing is the name given to mass mailings intended to trick recipients into reacting in some way. Either they click on a link and install a malicious program on the computer. Or they are linked to a page where they should enter their online banking access data.
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My bank has supposedly already told me that I have to re-enter my password. I also got some confusing bills. Quite often I even get mail from anonymous blackmailers who want me secretly filmed while I was consuming porn and who demand money. This seems to be a successful ploy.
I also read about a new method of fraud that seems to be very successful at the moment: a bogus Federal Criminal Police Office writes and calls people and accuses them of an unspecified crime. They could now buy their way out of it with a bank transfer.
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Apparently people commit so many unpunished crimes that they consider such an email to be understandable and pay for it. Perhaps the real Federal Criminal Police Office should simply adopt this technology. They could bolster the state treasury a bit with that, and people would no longer have to have such a bad conscience.
My employer wants to make me more aware of such scams. He now regularly sends me e-mails informing me which phishing e-mails he has blocked for me. It lists the subject lines that were used to try to scam me: “Unique time for the best intimacy”, “Hondrostrong cream to combat joint pain, arthritis and osteoarthritis” or “Everyone can find their own love”.
Until now, only my employer himself would have had the opportunity to cheat me out of my money with the wrong payslip. The world of crime, on the other hand, obviously expects the greatest success from addressing me as a lust-sick, lonely old man with rheumatism.
I don’t know what that says about me. I wish I could write back to these people.
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