What Is A SIM-Swap Attack & How Can You Protect Yourself from It?

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Fraud and account break-ins can be done by taking over a subscriber identity module (SIM) card or SIM swap. By taking over the SIM card, the perpetrator can access the victim's bank account causing unlimited losses. SIM swap cases that have occurred can steal victims' savings of up to millions.

What Is a SIM Swap Attack?

SIM swap attack is a SIM card takeover that aims to steal data and then break into banking accounts. It’s an act of breaking into someone's digital banking account by taking over the victim's SIM card number from the perpetrator so that they can access the victim’s digital banking account using personal data that has been controlled.

To do a SIM swap, the hacker needs the victim's personal data. For example, the telephone number and operator used, bank account number, banking application used, full name, date of birth, e-mail, access to e-mail, photo ID, credit card, or other important data.

How It Works

The main key in the case of a SIM swap is personal data. The hacker collects or steals someone's personal data either through social media or phishing techniques.

Phishing is a cyber crime that targets sensitive information or data of victims via email, social media posts, or text messages. The common technique is using phishing, then social engineering, because the data was leaked out, followed by a SIM swap and access to the mobile banking application, then the breach occurred.

Social engineering is a technique in which hackers do to the targeted victims by using panic or fear. One of the social engineering techniques is to give fear to the target so that the target wants to believe in him.

First, phishing is made to resemble and act on behalf of a particular agency related to the victim. For example, the victim received an email saying that his account had purchased game diamonds worth $ 300K.

Then, the narrative continues, if the transaction was never made, then the potential victim will be asked to cancel the transaction. In fact, the transaction never existed and there is no need for cancellation.

Victims who are provoked will be asked to open the attached document in the email, under the pretext of canceling the transaction. You can also fill in personal data on certain sites that are packaged like official pages. Fraud is packaged in such a way that the victim believes and wants to fill in his personal data completely.

Phishing is often coupled with social engineering so that the victim can be trapped in a certain situation that the perpetrator wants. The social engineering technique is usually scary and gives the impression of a solution.

The personal data obtained from phishing is used by the hacker to convince cellular operators to deactivate the SIM card being used by the victim. In the next step, the hacker will come to an operator outlet according to the victim's SIM card number, bringing fake personal data

After that, the hacker will come to the cellular operator's office with an engineering case, then ask the customer service to block the victim's SIM number. The number was requested to be diverted to the hacker. After that, the perpetrator also got unlimited access by taking over the SIM card he did.

Seeing how this attack can be terrible for anybody, we’d want to advise you to be careful on the internet. One way you can do to make the security better is by using a VPN. The VPN helps protect your data from unauthorized access. That way, you can always be safer when accessing the internet.

How to Avoid It

In order to avoid a SIM swap, here are some ways you can do it:

1. Don't give out personal data carelessly

Don't give personal data to anyone via the internet, or digital channels that are not trusted. It is better for the public to cancel transactions involving personal data in the digital realm, especially if they are in doubt or feel that there is a suspicious site.

2. Do not just click anything you see

It is important to ensure that links or sources of information that we can trust are official. For every link that we will click, which directs us to provide our personal important data, make sure whether the link is an official link or an original link.

Do not just click on links because there are several fake or fictitious sites that can carry malware applications. Usually, these sites are accompanied by a narrative that offers fake discounts or offers fantastic prizes.

3. Recognize phishing links

Fake websites are usually made to look like real sites, but the domain name cannot be copied exactly. The appearance of the website seems original, but the domain name is wrong or completely different.

Thus, it is important to trace the direction of the link before clicking on it. Try to check sites that can recognize phishing links or not, before we click or provide our personal data on the link.

One way to find out the source or direction of a link is to copy the link into the search field on Google. Alternatively, it can be traced through a third-party URL explorer. For example, on the who.is site, domainbigdata.com, wheregoes.com, or urlscan.io.

You do this by copying the link and searching in the site's search field. Then the source details and more specific details will appear. So we don't have to click on suspicious links and get caught in phishing.