Expert warns of a disguised virus in an ordinary Telegram message

The Mamont virus is spreading in Telegram, which reads SMS messages, push notifications, and photos from the gallery to gain access to payment systems. Alexei Ermakov, an IT expert at the cybersport department of the Game Industry and Cybersport Faculty of Synergy University, told Prime on January 30 about the danger of this trojan.

He warned that scammers often send files - malware installers - while asking the question "Is that you in the video?". The expert noted that this virus is not a novelty, but the greatest interest is in its distribution scheme, which is based on a request to identify a photo/video or track the delivery of favorably purchased goods.

"Like other similar viruses, Mamont requires active actions of the device user himself. Therefore, it should be understood that any click, following a link, downloading applications and the like is an area of personal responsibility," said Ermakov.

As the specialist pointed out, the danger of this virus is that it can independently manage SMS-banking and steal user's personal data. Therefore, owners of devices need to be extremely cautious in their activity on the Internet.

Thus, in case of infection detection it is necessary to notify their bank operators about the incident as soon as possible, change access to payment systems and even to accounts in social networks, the expert recommended, as fraudsters can use any of the accounts for their own purposes.

To protect your device from virus penetration, you should not click on dubious links that may turn out to be malicious, Yermakov emphasized. However, he added that there is no hundred percent reliable protection against Mamont.

Consciousness token: in the Russian Federation will limit the deposit of money on virtual cards

But only on those released less than two days ago - this is needed to combat a massive cheating scheme

Earlier, on January 27, an expert of the direction "Popular Front. Analytics" Alla Khrapunova said that fraudsters send phishing links to Telegram users on behalf of the service. According to her, the attackers create a special secret chat in Telegram, where they inform that there is a request to delete accounts, and to cancel the decision users need to follow the link sent.