Students experiencing rise in phishing scams

Nine in 10 Warwick students have experienced bots in university or society spaces, The Boar has found, as the University issues a warning against an increase in phishing and scams.

Bots regularly target society group chats, including The Boar’s writers’ group chats, appearing to sell tickets for popular concerts and sports matches.

Other phishing activity also involves targeted emails, known as ‘spear-phishing’, which are designed to trick people into thinking that a trusted source, such as the University, are reaching out to seek data.

This often allows hackers to steal someone’s personal information or money, or to deploy malware onto a computer. Such attacks are usually targeted towards specific individuals.

One student told The Boar that they had received an email from a scammer “claiming to be Stuart Croft”, Warwick’s Vice-Chancellor, which told them to “reply as soon as possible”.

These findings come after the University’s Information and Digital Group (IDG) issued a warning to “be aware” of such emails, which “may appear to come from trusted colleagues, legitimate suppliers, or University-related services”.

It also comes amid a rise in criminal activity and ‘dodgy’ scams targeting students, with recent figures finding that young people aged 18 to 24 are losing £400 on average to financial scams, including fake tickets and insurance fraud.

While the problem may be hitting the inboxes of unsuspecting Warwick community members, it is in the many society WhatsApp group chats that the problem seems to be affecting students the most.

In a survey carried out by The Boar, over 3/4 of society exec members (76%) said they had struggled to keep on top of managing bots.

Exec members are often left to wonder whether they “have just kicked out a bot or a possible new member”, as one exec member told The Boar.

Other students also added that they receive spam messages in society group chats and requests from bots to join “almost daily”.

This problem isn’t limited to Warwick either. Investigations in student publications including The Cheese Grater at UCL, Varsity at Cambridge, and The Mancunion at Manchester have also found similar problems affecting their societies.

Even if an email looks convincing, don’t assume it is genuine

Warwick IDG

The investigations found that the scammers usually join these group chats en masse, asking students to message them if they are interested in buying tickets for events including Sabrina Carpenter and Oasis concerts and the FA Cup final.

The Cheese Grater also found that the bots – who are completely unrelated to the university –  will often ask for payments for these ‘tickets’ via PayPal, only to later change their contact details.

While societies can opt not to “put the link to their group chats in their bio”, as the outgoing Vice-President for Warwick Fencing commented, the fight against bots is set to continue, especially into the new academic year as freshers seek to join group chats.

As phishing and scams continue to circulate around Warwick, the University has urged staff and students to be vigilant against possible bot activity and to report anything they are unsure of to the IDG Service Desk.

“Even if an email looks convincing, don’t assume it is genuine”, the IDG added. “Each reporting helps protect you and the wider University community.”