The Philippines’ national bank, Bank of the Philippines Islands (BPI), revealed it took down at least 10 phishing sites per day, as cybersecurity threats rise during the COVID-19 pandemic.
From March to August, the country has seen a sharp rise in COVID-19-related cyberattacks, according to the Bank.
“They send out malicious emails with COVID-19 themes to steal information and put up fake crowdfunding pages for supposedly personal protective equipment donations,” said BPI Executive Vice President, Ramon Jocson.
To date, the Bank has taken down over 2,000 phishing sites, many of which are local scammers targeting fellow Filipinos.
Cybersecurity in the Philippines
Like many countries all around the world, the Philippines is dealing with a surge in cybersecurity threats from unknown cybercriminals. As the country’s workforce retreats to remote work, the BPI has vowed to up cybersecurity measures to protect its employees and customers from online scams.
“On our non-technical side, we heavily count on the infomercials that we post on social media channels to inform clients about the different fraud schemes that have sprung up,” continued Jocson.
The BPI also provides tips on how to remain cyber safe, secure and smart during the pandemic.
“We try to detect abnormal behaviors. We track close to 22,000 events per second — every ATM withdrawal, log on and so forth — and we have analytics to track any aberrant behavior,” he added.
In September, seeing the rise in cybersecurity threats, Philippines conglomerate MVP Group established the private sector’s first Cybersecurity Council. Last month, Facebook revealed that it took down fake accounts spreading political misinformation, a handful of which were linked to government entities in the Philippines.
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Image credit: Reuters
