"Chinese 'RedZei' Group Batters Victims With Incessant Vishing Effort"

Chinese threat actors have been targeting Chinese-speaking students in the UK with a novel phone scam aimed at stealing their personal information via repeated phone calls and voicemails that are difficult for victims or carriers to reject. Will Thomas, a cybersecurity researcher, disclosed that a gang dubbed RedZei or RedThief calls victims once or twice per month from a unique UK-based phone number, leaving an unusual automated voicemail message if the recipient does not answer. Thomas has been tracking the campaign for over a year and has developed a profile of the threat actors based on the calls and voicemails. He stated that it is difficult to prevent subsequent attempts to compromise victims once they have been targeted by the scam, which uses social engineering to obtain personal information from students. RedZei uses a new pay-as-you-go UK-based phone number from one of the major mobile network operators for each wave of scam calls, he explained. This renders blocking the crooks' phone numbers practically ineffective. Phone-based scams, also known as vishing, are not new among cybercriminals. In an attempt to scam victims, threat actors have been known to use entire call centers to make fraudulent robocalls, mimicking banks and other trustworthy businesses. In another variation, criminals have used emails or other Internet-based contact methods to encourage victims to call a fake "tech support" line, where their personal information is taken for malicious purposes. The RedZei campaign employs some similar strategies, but adds its own spin to the vishing scam. It has used well-known companies, such as the Bank of China or China Mobile (CMLink), in socially engineered campaigns designed to trick students into divulging their personal information. This article continues to discuss the new RedZei campaign targeting Chinese-speaking students in the UK. 

Dark Reading reports "Chinese 'RedZei' Group Batters Victims With Incessant Vishing Effort"