With the advent of the vacation period in schools and colleges, cyber criminals are expected to get hands on the most vulnerable target, kids. No matter if you play Candy Crush Saga or Counter Strike, you can easily become a target of cyber-attacks. eScan threat research team points out that there will be sudden spurt in malware attacks due to the various gaming sites used by the kids.
73% of the world's largest gaming platforms have admitted that most of their gamer accounts get hacked frequently during the vacation period. Our internal research studies shows that during this period there is always an increase in the cyber-attacks targeted mainly to kids using gaming or entertainment related sites. With the ongoing vacation season, we expect the attacks to further grow more, but also may extend to mobile device users.
Not just the kids, even adults use gaming cheat codes as they are tempted to use short-cuts to finish the level with high scores. However many of the websites where these alleged codes are available are may infect your device/computer.
Cyber criminals hunt for financial & personal data from various gaming sites for financial gains. Creating a fake payment page of a popular gaming site or copying a sketchy entertainment site or even creating fake online gaming sites with incredibly attractive games, are some of the ways to target unsuspecting or unaware users.
eScan reminds users to beware of gaming scams that may enter through the following ways:
Consumers must be cautious on receiving unsolicited texts or emails from the gaming sites. It is also recommended to not share personal information with unreliable sites.
Some of the preventive measures to be secured against threats of phishing and malware attacks as recommended by eScan include:
To enjoy safe gaming experience with your smartphone or personal computer, try the enhanced protection provided by eScan's range of security solutions.