Hackers are currently preying on innocent WhatsApp users by attempting to steal their personal and banking information using the said platform. App developers started warning their users on Jan. 3 about this scam.
According to Express, hackers are on the move to steal people's identity and even financial information using WhatsApp by having users open and download a specific file. They use a file that looks exactly like a real Word document and they will send it in the chatbox of the app while talking to their prospective victim. This file contains a special kind of virus to do hacking.
As soon as the person downloads and opens the file, the hacker could already phish the details on the user's device for bank details and other personal information. Banking transactions could be pulled out by the said virus and it could also look like an Excel of PDF file.
India is the first country that has been affected by it as of the moment and everybody is hoping that it ends there. Investigators found out that the virus inflicted files have names reflecting the organizations, National Defense Academy (NDA) and the National Investigation Agency (NIA). Hackers use these filenames to entice WhatsApp subscribers to download and open the file.
Based on these facts, investigators are suspecting that the hackers are aiming for the police and other people who are connected to the government. Phone Arena reported that the kind of operating system running the phones that were affected by it was not determined. Since the attack happened in India where cheap phones are mostly sold, experts are assuming that owners of Android phones were its first victims.
WhatsApp developers are now calling out all of its users, warning them to not download nor open a file from their platform if it looks like a Word, Excel or a PDF document. Users are advised to only talk to someone they know and trust if they ever are planning on exchanging files online.