Nearly 50 Percent Of Phishing Threats In Indonesia Attack The Financial Sector

JAKARTA - Rapid digitization due to the pandemic has increased cyber efforts globally, especially in the financial sector, including in Indonesia.

In an analogy, the development of digitalization in the financial sector is like a double-edged sword. In addition to facilitating transactions, the Financial Services Authority (OJK) assesses that digitalization also increases the possibility of cyber attacks by 86.70 percent.

In Indonesia, for example, the threat of phishing still targets the financial sector from banking, payment systems, and online shops. Kaspersky's latest data for Indonesia in the period from February to April 2022 shows that almost half (47.08 percent) of phishing attempts are related to finance.

The percentage comes from anonymized data based on deterministic component triggers in the Kaspersky Anti-Phishing system on the user's computer. The component detects all pages with phishing content that the user tries to open by following a link in an email message or on the web, as long as the link to this page exists in the Kaspersky database.

Based on Kaspersky statistics, this year the banking sector and payment system in Indonesia faced the most phishing attempts during February, with 4.38 percent and 34.85 percent respectively.

This can also be attributed to an increase in the value of digital payment transactions by up to 41.35 percent by February 2022, according to Bank Indonesia.

On the other hand, online stores are also not spared from phishing attempts with the highest number occurring at 15.66 percent in April this year for Indonesia.

“In addition to increasing adoption of digital transactions in Southeast Asia, we are also seeing the emergence of “Super Apps” in the region. It is a mobile application that combines all popular monetary functions including e-banking, mobile wallet, online shopping, insurance, travel booking, and even investment," said Yeo Siang Tiong, General Manager for Southeast Asia at Kaspersky.

Yeo added that putting our data and digital money in one place could trigger a snowball effect after, with the impact of phishing attacks swelling at an unexpected rate.

Super Apps are a way for traditional banks and service providers to stand out in a bustling industry. When they try to work with third parties and combine their services into a single mobile app, the attack surface expands, opening more doors for malicious exploits.