The FBI warns users about cybercriminals impersonating brands using search engine ads, Tesla offers $7500 rebate on some cars and a robocall firm faces a $300 million fine.
This is all the tech news that is trending right now. Welcome to trending hashtags. It’s Friday, December 23rd, and I’m your host, Samira Balsara.
The FBI is warning the public that cybercriminals are using search engine advertising services to impersonate brands and redirect users to malicious websites that host ransomware and steal login credentials and financial information. Cyber criminals buy advertisements that appear in web search results using the same domain as a real business. These ads link to a webpage similar to the impersonated business and contain links to download software that is actually malware. The download page looks legitimate and the download is named after the program the user wants to download. These cyberattack methods have also been used to impersonate websites associated with finance, especially crypto exchange platforms. The FBI advises users to verify the URL to make sure the site is authentic before clicking through, type the business url directly into a search engine instead of looking up the business, and install an ad blocker extension. The FBI also recommends businesses alert consumers when they see domains similar to theirs, educate users on fake programs and how to find the correct URLs of software they want to install.
source: FBI
Mashable reports that Tesla is offering $7,500 in credit and 10,000 miles of free Supercharging on new Model 3 and Model Y cars in the US. The car is to be delivered between December 21 and 31, 2022, which means the company is looking to boost sales before the end of the quarter. The company is also offering a $5,000 credit for Model 3 and Model Y cars in Canada and 6,000 yuan ($860) off on some models in China. The US federal tax credit limit that was imposed on Tesla due to the company shipping more than 200,000 cars a year will also be removed on January 1, 2023. Tesla was offering up to $3750 off on some cars earlier this month. The fact that the discount has been doubled suggests that Tesla is not happy with the demand for its cars this holiday quarter.
source: Mashable
The FCC has fined a robocall company $300 million, claiming the firm, in its largest investigation to date, made more than 5 billion calls in three months, which is more than 5 billion calls for each call in the United States. That’s enough to call the person 15 times, Engadget reported. In July this year, the FCC ordered its first “K4 Notice” and “N2 Order”, instructing all US telephone providers to block traffic related to car warranty scam calls, resulting in a 99 percent drop in volume. I. Such calls, since June. FCC proposes its largest fine ever as it finds robocallers to have committed “serious violations,” including persistent calls, harassment, or using dirty tricks like calling health care workers from bad hospital numbers . The firm also violated several FCC rules, such as failing to identify the caller at the beginning of the message.
source: Engadget
As TechXplore reports, Philadelphians earned freebies to use an old-fashioned public payphone at a bookstore as part of Mike Dank and Naveen Albert’s Philtel project, a campaign to protest big tech and undermine public communications infrastructure. Was started for the restoration of. The founders said efforts to restore public phones also represent society’s resistance to rapid and mindless adoption of technology, to the detriment of personal choice and the environment. Dank said in an interview that the first Philtel telephone was an opportunity to demonstrate that Philtel could successfully set up a phone and keep the hardware connecting the phone to the Internet running.
source: techexplore
This is all the tech news that is trending right now. Hashtag Trending is a part of the ITWC Podcast Network. Add us to your Alexa Flash Briefing or your Google Home Daily Briefing. Be sure to sign up for our Daily IT Wire Newsletter to get important news straight to your inbox every day. Plus, check out the next episode of Hashtag Tendencies, our weekly hashtag trending episode in French, which drops every Thursday morning. If you have any suggestion or tip, drop us a line in the comments or via email. Thanks for listening, and we hope you had a wonderful holiday season. I am Sameera Balsara.
