PC gamers targeted in new Discord phishing scam
Stay away from Discord offers that sound too good to be true
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Cybersecurityresearchers have run into a newphishingcampaign that is being promoted via messages on the gaming-centric messaging platformDiscord.
Researchers fromMalwarebytescaught wind of the campaign that promises a free Discord Nitro subscription by asking users to link to theirSteamaccount.
Discord Nitro is a paid membership plan on the popular Voice over IP (VoIP) and instant messaging platform, which offers several perks.
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Threat actors have run phishing campaigns riding on the popularity of Discord Nitroearlier as well. However the scam is unique in that it doesn’t go after the victim’s Discord credentials.
Using Discord Nitro as a lure, instead of handing over the signup process to the officialSteamservice, the fraudsters use a fake Steam login page that’s deceptively similar to the original, in order to make away with the victim’s Steam credentials.
Deceptive misdirection
Breaking down the campaign, theresearchers sharethat the phishing scam is being conducted through several Discord accounts controlled by the threat actors, as well as through automated bots that send other users links to what is supposedly a guide on how to upgrade to Discord Nitro for free for a month.
“See, here free nitro 1 month, just link your Steam account and enjoy,” reads the phishing messages sent to Discord users.
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The link however ferries victims to a phishing website with a fake pop-up Steam login page that even has the audacity of getting users to verify that the victims have keyed in their correct Steam credentials.
“Note that the fake pop-up window displays the proper “steamcommunity.com” domain—but do not be fooled. This is just another way for scammers to make fake things look believably real,” warn the researchers, who say they’ve found more than a hundred other scammy domains registered to the IP address used by the threat actors in this scam.
With almost two decades of writing and reporting on Linux, Mayank Sharma would like everyone to think he’sTechRadar Pro’sexpert on the topic. Of course, he’s just as interested in other computing topics, particularly cybersecurity, cloud, containers, and coding.
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