UK Authorities Strike Back: 43 Fraudulent Web Domains Blocked in Cybercrime Crackdown

Phishing attacks have wreaked havoc in the crypto industry. In a recent move to combat cyber fraud, the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) in the United Kingdom announced the blocking of 43 web domains associated with fraudulent activities.

Spearheaded by the City of London Police, this crackdown follows the discovery of a spoof email address masquerading as the legitimate crypto site blockchain.com.

43 Suspicious Web Domains Blocked

According to Pete O’Doherty, the temporary commissioner of the City of London Police, 42 additional suspicious web domains, such as “actionfraud.info” and “department-fraud.com,” were blocked upon detection.

The NFIB highlighted the importance of promptly reporting cybercrimes through their official channels and hotline, urging victims to come forward.

As of December 2023, the NFIB has already removed nearly 300,000 malicious websites, demonstrating the scale of the ongoing threat.

Among the various fraudulent schemes, some attempts even resort to claiming unsuspecting recipients have won prizes like a Tupperware set, highlighting the diverse tactics used by cybercriminals.

Even with proactive actions taken, phishing continues to pose a persistent threat in the industry. However, following best practices for cold wallet usage, protecting seed phrases, conducting regular security audits and updates, refraining from clicking on unfamiliar links and staying vigilant can help in safeguarding assets.

Increasing Phishing Attacks

Scam Sniffer’s latest analysis indicated an increase in phishing attacks in January coinciding with heightened activity within crypto communities following a series of airdrops in the previous month.

Data reveals that scammers set up more than 11,400 phishing websites in January, posing as platforms like Manta Network, Frame, SatoshiVM, AltLayer, Dymension, zkSync, Pyth, OpenSea, Optimism, Blast, and others.

These efforts yielded substantial gains as cybercriminals managed to steal nearly $55 million worth of digital assets across Ethereum Virtual Machine-based networks, with the top seven victims collectively losing $17 million.

A similar analysis by SlowMist’s security team revealed that nearly 80% of comments under tweets of prominent projects were phishing scam accounts.