Internet has turned into a powerful tool for the criminals to defraud unsuspecting users across the Middle East. A study conducted by Naif Arab University for Security Sciences and Interpol revealed the extent of financial fraud crimes targeting Arab countries.
According to a review of 503 fake adverts, the number of daily visits from potential victims of these fraudulent sites reaches 137,000 per day, with the top 5 fraud tactics in the fields of investment, business email, romantic text message fraud, and sexual blackmail.
The study stated that five different types of financial frauds are prevalent in the Arab world, with 24 criminal methods being used to reach the victims.
According to the study “The Role of Financial Institutions in Reducing Information Crimes,” published in early January 2022, there are significant differences in the willingness of concerned authorities to confront online financial crimes regarding the electronic reporting mechanisms available to victims of electronic fraud.
The study, which tries to detect online fraudsters’ criminal tools, methods, and strategies and their mechanism of victim access, discovered a complex criminal procedure that required the victim to be victimized twice and in two different ways. The first came in the form of deceptive investment advertisements, while the second came in advertisements for legal consulting firms claiming to be able to recover the money.
The findings of the fraudulent ad analysis confirmed that fraudsters use advertising agents to spread their ads on widespread and trusted websites and use electronic advertising models for online advertising agents and artificial intelligence techniques in advertising companies to reach potential victims.
The research discovered that the top five fraudulent domains were published online inside roughly 40,000 advertising links by exploiting the Internet domain registration mechanism, with 93% of the fraudulent domains registered in generic top-level domains and only 7% in country code top-level domains.
This research is a part of Naif Arab University for Security Sciences’ 2019-2023 strategy, which focuses on applied research through the university’s Cybercrime and Digital Evidence Center, which was established in 2021, to be the first Arab reference in empowering Arab competencies in the areas of cybercrime and digital evidence.
It’s worth noting that Naif Arab University for Security Sciences, which is affiliated with the Council of Arab Interior Ministers, focuses on qualifying and developing Arab competencies specialized in combating financial and fraud crimes through academic, training, and research programs in collaboration with various relevant international institutions.