BPI takes down nearly 2,000 phishing sites since March

MANILA, Philippines — Nearly 2,000 phishing sites were shut down by Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) since coronavirus lockdowns were enforced in mid-March.

The number translated to at least 10 phishing sites being taken down by the Ayala-led lender since the health crisis accelerated a shift to online transactions of consumers, the bank said in a statement on Tuesday.

“They send out malicious emails with COVID-19 (coronavirus disease-2019) themes to steal information and put up fake crowd-funding pages for supposedly PPE (personal protective equipment) donations,” Ramon Jocson, executive vice-president and chief operating officer, said.

“A lot of the crimes being committed involve Filipinos targeting fellow Filipinos — getting their credentials, posing as clients of the banks, and then doing unauthorized withdrawals,” he added.

Phishing refers to the fraudulent practice of sending e-mails pretending to come from reputable companies to extract personal information such as passwords and credit card numbers with the intent to use them illegally. 

BPI has been tracking close to 22,000 banking transactions per second to detect and prevent phishing and other “abnormal behaviors” that can jeopardize customer information, Jocson said. Awareness campaigns were also launched to familiarize depositors on most common cyber-attacks.

“On our non-technical side, we heavily count on the infomercials that we post on our social media channels to inform our clients about the different fraud schemes that have sprung up. We also give them tips on how to remain cyber safe, secure, and smart during these times,” he pointed out.

Banking regulators have long expected that the dramatic shift to digital platforms inevitably attracts hackers out to illicitly steal information and money. To counter this, the central bank has reminded lenders to be vigilant in upgrading their systems.

“Hackers would always have a way of looking for ways to penetrate or take advantage of small gaps that they want to capitalize,” Chuchi Fonacier, deputy governor at Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, said in a text message last week.

“That’s why BSP’s emphasis is for banks to be resilient. When something happens to their system, they should be able to keep it up and running in a short period of time,” she added.