Scammers stole more than HK$4 million, or about $500,000, from an employee of a cryptocurrency exchange company in Hong Kong by using a hijacked WhatsApp account and a fake work group. Over the past two weeks, Hong Kong police recorded more than 150 cases of this type of fraud, with total losses exceeding HK$15 million.

The employee used a WhatsApp group to communicate with colleagues and several clients. After gaining access to his account, the attackers blocked the original work chat and blacklisted all its members, preventing the employee from contacting them through the messaging service.

The scammers then created another group that copied the real chat’s name, image, participant avatars and membership list, making the fake group appear to be the original.

In the new group, an attacker posed as a client representative and submitted what appeared to be a routine request to exchange cryptocurrency. Following the standard procedure, the employee first transferred the cryptocurrency to the specified wallet and then attempted to debit the corresponding amount from the client’s account.

The employee became suspicious when he found that the client’s cryptocurrency account did not contain enough funds for the debit. He contacted the client directly, and the client denied submitting an exchange request.

Further checks showed that every participant in the new group was a fake copy and that the employee’s WhatsApp account was linked to an unknown device. The employee then realized that the attackers had been controlling his account for some time.

Source: Incrypted