Public warned over sharing bank details online

THE Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) urged Filipinos to be more cautious of disclosing sensitive information online especially those that involves bank account details.

Many victims of online bank scamming had aired their complaints on social media for huge amount of money that was apparently stolen from their account. Because of this, the BSP released a statement warning Filipinos against Phishing and Spoofing. Phishing is when fraudsters ask for the victim’s personal information through a legitimate-looking email address. Spoofing, on the other hand, is when these fraudsters send a website link to the victim’s email address, which when clicked can immediately access the person’s account details.

In order to avoid being victimized by these fraudsters, BSP warns Filipinos to verify first with their respective banks the validity of the emails that they received. This can also be directly reported to BSP through consumeraffairs@bsp.gov.ph. In Davao City, BSP can be contacted through (082) 226-4130.

These suspicious emails usually are asking the victim’s personal information such as username, password, account and card number, PIN, and birthday. BSP clarifies that legit bank email messages would not ask for these information.

Usually, phishing and spoofing email messages also come with generic greetings, bad grammar, and misspelled words. However, it does not contain the full contact information of the sender.

Filipinos are also being made cautious of these emails messages that are typically received. Further, some of them also links the receiver to a unknown website.