South African Loan Seekers get Wonga Finance Spoofed Scam E-mail

A phishing e-mail campaign is targeting people in South Africa ripping them off their money via messages presenting loans at very low interest rates while posing as dispatched from Wonga the supplier of loans for short term periods, published humanipo.com dated April 8, 2014.

According to a report from SAPA (South African Press Association), the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (called the Hawks) of SAPS (South African Police Service) in charge of Western Cape stated that 3 persons had complained about receiving the phishing e-mail that offered loans costing as low as 3.5% interest.

The scam message directed loan applicants for remitting money to take care of expenses such as legal, administration and agent's charges so application for the loan could get processed.

Malcolm Pojie, Spokesperson for SA Police said that an electronic mail was dispatched to e-mail account holders telling they had an opportunity to borrow money from Wonga Finance SA (Pty) that was an authorized credit supplier, reported humanipo.com.

Pojie further said that a complainant had paid ZAR 24,000 (USD 2,300) in total but didn't get any money allocated as the loan.

Chief Executive Officer Kevin Hurwitz at Wonga SA stated that his company knew about the e-mail fraud that utilized Wonga SA's registration number, logo as well as its National Credit Regulator number. Thenewage.co.za reported this dated April 8, 2014.

Hurwitz informed that genuine Wonga loans could solely be sought through Wonga's website while no upfront fee was ever requested.

A study conducted in 2013 showed that South Africa ranked No.2 among the nations that received the maximum phishing scams.

Phishing scams include electronic mails posing as sent from reputable establishments asking recipients to remit money or personal information.

Hurwitz cautioned people towards verifying if an e-mail of the kind was real via confirming from the organization apparently sending it. He added that the offer seeming as unbelievably true should be eschewed.

Meanwhile, within a similar phishing scam targeting a financial institution during the previous two months, customers of Johannesburg, South Africa situated Standard Bank too got struck with phishing e-mails in a widespread scam during H2-March 2014.

» SPAMfighter News - 4/17/2014