All car owners, beware of ETC fraud
□ Our reporter Zhan Haifeng
□ Our correspondent Feng Jinbo
The “Traffic Management Bureau” sent a text message saying that the vehicle’s ETC is about to expire and needs to log on to the website to update the information. This website still looks decent and asks you to enter your bank card number and password. At this time, the owner should pay attention.
Recently, the "Anti-fraud Early Warning Platform" of Wanzhou Police in Chongqing has successively received early warning information about ETC fraud, and some people have also come to consult, saying that they have received business reminder text messages from "China ETC", "Traffic Management Bureau" and other institutions about ETC. The text message contains an unknown webpage link, which is suspected to be a fraudulent text message.
Subsequently, the police launched investigations.
"Realistic" SMS hides ETC scams
Huang, the owner of a car in Luotian, Wanzhou, received a text message from the Traffic Management Bureau on his mobile phone, stating that his ETC account will expire the next day, and relevant information must be updated immediately, otherwise it will affect the itinerary.
Because Huang usually uses ETC, he is worried that it will affect his travel when it fails, so he has no doubt about this information, so he clicks on the link attached in the text message and enters a website called "China ETC Online Certification Center".
Because the website interface is "very formal", Huang relaxes his vigilance. According to the page requirements, first enter the license plate number, click to enter the verification, and then the system displays "Your current ETC card is abnormal. Please bind your bank card or credit card to re-sign for fast pass" , Then, Huang followed the requirements step by step, inputting his ETC binding deduction bank account number, transaction password, account balance, and mobile phone number before submitting.
Soon, Huang received a verification code from the other party. According to the prompts on the web page, he entered the verification code and waited for the ban to be lifted.
"Fortunately, a thought suddenly flashed in my mind at that time. These operations are very similar to the electronic frauds promoted by the police in peacetime. Will they be tricky?" To be cautious, Huang immediately went to the Luotian police station in his jurisdiction to consult the police.
"The text message you received is an ETC fraud, which is a typical ETC fraud." When the policeman Zhang Yiwen clearly informed Huang that this was a fraud and explained the fraud tricks to him in detail, Huang immediately made a "wise" decision for himself at a critical moment. Fortunately, I avoided losing tens of thousands of dollars in the bank card in the next few minutes.
Police reveal ETC fraud tricks
"This kind of scam is very confusing. The scammer creates a platform that is very similar to the official website, pretends to be a regular ETC channel platform, and then attaches the illegal link to make it difficult for car owners to distinguish between true and false, and step by step to trick car owners into a trap. According to Zhang Yiwen, according to police investigations, in addition to fake "ETC Center", scammers will also use "high-speed management center" and "vehicle management center" to send "phishing" text messages to car owners to gain the trust of car owners. The content of the text messages is varied. Such as "ETC expired certification, system upgrade, invalid activation, card is deactivated, card is frozen", the purpose is to trick the victim to click on the "phishing link" in the text message.
At present, car owners have been deceived in many places across the country, including Sichuan, Chongqing, Shanghai, and Anhui.
According to the police, although these pages contain multiple sections, no matter which page the owner clicks on, all types of important real information must be filled in the secondary page entered.
And when the scammer gets the victim's three real information, "ID number, bank card number, and payment password", the scammer has already obtained the victim's withdrawal information.
"But these scam tricks are invariable. The most important thing is that the victim clicks on the link "payment verification code" and completes the verification." The police said that all the information mentioned above, scammers are used to bind third-party payment Yes, and only after getting the verification code of the bank card associated with the victim’s ETC account can the money be transferred out.
Keep in mind two points to stay away from ETC scams
In the name of expiration or invalidation of ETC certification, batches of phishing text messages and links are sent to citizens to trick car owners into entering bank card passwords and other sensitive information. Since ETC is generally closely related to banks, victims often lack vigilance when encountering such fraud. As a result, the incidence of such online fraud is relatively high.
The police reminded that by keeping in mind the following two points, you can effectively prevent being deceived.
First of all, you should not click on the "phishing" link in the text message that you receive similar to the above-mentioned ETC text message. Any text message link that requires you to fill in important information such as bank card account number, password, verification code, etc. is almost a scammer, and you receive such suspicious information , Citizens must call the official phone to verify the cause, and proceed under the official guidance.
Adhere to one principle: whoever the liar pretends to be, you should ask the real "who".
Secondly, there is no such thing as "expiration" in ETC accounts; the validity period of ETC in-vehicle devices is 10 years, and there is no need to operate bank accounts when renewing; ETC device activation, system upgrades, etc. do not need to operate bank accounts.
That is to say, when the ETC card expires or there is a loss report reset situation, the ETC device will be stopped. At this time, the main thing the car does is to re-enter the new card information through the ETC partner after the card is replaced, and it can be reused .
Therefore, when handling ETC business, citizens should directly go to the bank to handle it. If they have any questions, they can directly call the bank's official hotline or directly go to the bank counter to handle it; if they encounter fraud, they should dial 110 to report to the police in time.