Fans of The Last of Us are being warned as scammers are taking advantage of the excitement around HBO’s new adaption of the popular game franchise.
The gripping Sky Atlantic series shows an almost decimated civilisation, twenty years after a global pandemic. Hardened survivor Joel takes care of a 14-year-old girl who could be mankind's only hope.
Viewers have been left desperate for more, with episodes dropping weekly, with sales for the game the series was based on jumping up by more than 200%.
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And a tech expert is now warning of two scams doing the rounds at the moment, that could see people's banking information and other financial data stolen.
Prateek Jha from VPNOverview.com told the ECHO: “Gamers are a popular target for cybercriminals because, in addition to personal information, passwords, and bank card data, scammers may steal their gaming accounts with internal currency and rare skins, for example, using stealers."
Two scams in particular have been highlighted, with the first offering “The Last of Us Part II” for download. Anyone who attempts to download this fraudulent game will get malware on their device, cybersecurity company Kaspersky reports.
A PC remake of the original first part of The Last of Us is set for a March 2023 release, and both games are currently exclusive to PlayStation and not available for download. According to a 2022 Kaspersky report on gaming-related cyber threats by Securelist, between July 2021 and June 2022, approximately 384,224 gamers encountered thousands of malware disguised as games.
The second scam involves a website that offers an activation code for The Last of Us on PlayStation. The phishing site bundles the code with a “gift,” such as a PlayStation 5 or a $100 Roblox gift card.
To receive the code and the gift, users must pay a commission fee by entering their credentials and credit card data. Victims of this scam are left with nothing in return, as the scammers could use the stolen data to conduct various types of online fraud.
Between 2021 and 2022, there were over three million phishing attacks on online gaming platforms, with most of these designed to steal gamers’ account credentials and financial data.
The best way to stay ahead of such scams is to exercise caution and only download video games from official sources and trusted websites. If you come across any deals that seem too good to be true, do a quick Google search to check out their legitimacy.
Cybercriminals can also target gamers outside gaming platforms and forums, using malware disguised as legitimate software, so fans should be aware of this.
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