Over the last couple of days, we’ve intercepted a rather interesting fraudulent approach that’s not just successfully hitting the inboxes of users internationally, but is also popping up as an event on their Android Calendar apps.

How is this possible? Fairly simple.

Sample screenshot of the fraudulent Google Calendar invitation:

Google_Calendar_Dating_Scam_Email_Spam_Syndicate_Syndication

Through automatic registration — thanks to the outsourcing of the CAPTCHA solving process — fraudsters are registering thousands of bogus accounts to be later on abused as being part of Google’s Ecosystem, the Calendar feature in particular, which is also automatically syndicated on all Android devices.

Therefore, by automating the process of sending Calendar Invites, 419 advance fee scammers or virtually any type of scammers, are directly syndicating their fraudulent ‘proposals’ with the Android devices of their prospective victims. The tactics greatly remind us of known cases where 419 advance fee scammers are known to have abused Dilbert.com and NYTimes.com’s “Email This” feature in an attempt to successfully bypass anti-spam filters.

Due to the ease of registering tens of thousands of Google Accounts, or actually buying access to pre-registered accounts, we expect that this practice will continue, with the fraudsters behind it eventually shortening the time frame between the invitation and the actual event, to achieve a near real-time ‘reminder’ notification for a Calendar Event.

You can find more about Dancho Danchev at his LinkedIn Profile. You can also follow him on Twitter.

Blog Staff

About the Author

Blog Staff

The Webroot blog offers expert insights and analysis into the latest cybersecurity trends. Whether you’re a home or business user, we’re dedicated to giving you the awareness and knowledge needed to stay ahead of today’s cyber threats.

Share This