[2021 National Audit] 8 out of 10 Victims in the First Half of the Year Fall for 'Impersonating Institutions' Voice Phishing

Min Hyung-bae MP "Authorities Must Strive to Eradicate Impersonation Through Strict Crackdowns and Punishments"

[Asia Economy Reporter Kwangho Lee] It has been revealed that 83% of all voice phishing damages in the first half of this year were caused by crimes impersonating government agencies and others. The rapidly increasing government agency impersonation type not only surpassed the loan fraud type, which had been the perennial number one among damage types, but also occurred more than five times as much. This is analyzed to be due to the increased government-issued notifications related to disaster relief funds and COVID-19 text messages.

According to the 'Voice Phishing Damage Status by Crime Type' data submitted by the Financial Supervisory Service to Min Hyung-bae, a member of the National Assembly's Political Affairs Committee from the Democratic Party of Korea, among the 14,065 accounts that applied for voice phishing damage relief to the Financial Supervisory Service in the first half of this year, 83.4%, or 11,732 cases, were government agency impersonation types.

By year, government agency impersonation voice phishing accounted for 7,712 cases, or 15.4%, out of a total of 50,013 cases in 2017. It steadily increased to 21.7% in 2018, 22.4% in 2019, and 43.2% in 2020. Then, in the first half of this year, it accounted for 83.4% with 11,732 cases, surpassing the loan fraud type for the first time to become the most common type of voice phishing.

The institution most frequently impersonated by voice phishing criminals was the prosecution. According to the 'Voice Phishing Occurrence Status by Impersonated Institution' submitted by the National Police Agency, as of the end of August this year, voice phishing impersonating the prosecution accounted for 3,283 cases, or 70.2% of the total. This was followed by the police (6.1%, 287 cases) and the Financial Supervisory Service (5.5%, 256 cases).

Representative Min said, "As government-issued messages such as disaster relief funds, guidance on financial systems for the underprivileged, and COVID-19 notification texts surged due to COVID-19, the most common method of voice phishing seems to have changed to impersonating government agencies." He emphasized, "Since government agency impersonation voice phishing can even undermine the credibility of actual government messages, relevant authorities should make special efforts to eradicate it through strict crackdowns and punishments."