Facebook users need to remain vigilant after researchers at Abnormal Security uncovered the new phishing campaign designed to steal passwords from admin that run company Facebook pages.
The scam begins with a victim being sent a phishing email claiming to be from 'The Facebook Team’.
The email warns that the user's account might be disabled or the page might be removed over repeatedly posting content that infringes on someone else’s rights.
Once scaring a victim into thinking their Facebook profile could soon be taken down, the victim is invited to appeal the report by clicking on a link that the security researchers said goes to a Facebook post – and within this post, there's another link that directs users to a separate website. To file an ‘appeal’, a Facebook user is told to enter sensitive information including their name, email address, and Facebook password.
All this information is sent to the threat actor, who can exploit it to log in to the victim's Facebook page, gather sensitive details from their account, and potentially lock them out of it. If the victim re-uses their Facebook email address and password for other websites and applications, the attacker can access those too.
One of the reasons phishing attacks like this are successful is because they create a sense of urgency.
“What makes this attack interesting (and particularly effective) is that the threat actors are leveraging Facebook’s actual infrastructure to execute the attack. Rather than sending the target straight to the phishing site via a link in the email, the attackers first redirect them to a real post on Facebook. Because the threat actors use a valid Facebook URL in the email, it makes the landing page especially convincing and minimizes the chance the target will second-guess the legitimacy of the initial email,” researchers explained.
“In addition, it appears the attackers are targeting accounts of people who manage Facebook Pages for companies. For these individuals, a disabled Facebook account wouldn’t just be an inconvenience; it could have an impact on their marketing, branding, and revenue. If they believed their account was at risk, they would be particularly motivated to act quickly.”
If you have already been a victim of this campaign, or want to stay safe from any future threats, Facebook on its website has issued recommendations for its users.
The social network advises anyone who thinks they’ve fallen for a phishing scam to report it, change their password, and make sure they log out of any devices they don’t recognize. Facebook also recommends users turn on multi-factor authentication, which helps to add an extra level of security to their account.
