Quantify the value of Netskope One SSE – Get the 2024 Forrester Total Economic Impact™ study

close
close
  • Why Netskope chevron

    Changing the way networking and security work together.

  • Our Customers chevron

    Netskope serves more than 3,400 customers worldwide including more than 30 of the Fortune 100

  • Our Partners chevron

    We partner with security leaders to help you secure your journey to the cloud.

A Leader in SSE. Now a Leader in Single-Vendor SASE.

Learn why Netskope debuted as a leader in the 2024 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™️ for Single-Vendor Secure Access Service Edge

Get the report
Customer Visionary Spotlights

Read how innovative customers are successfully navigating today’s changing networking & security landscape through the Netskope One platform.

Get the eBook
Customer Visionary Spotlights
Netskope’s partner-centric go-to-market strategy enables our partners to maximize their growth and profitability while transforming enterprise security.

Learn about Netskope Partners
Group of diverse young professionals smiling
Your Network of Tomorrow

Plan your path toward a faster, more secure, and more resilient network designed for the applications and users that you support.

Get the white paper
Your Network of Tomorrow
Netskope Cloud Exchange

The Netskope Cloud Exchange (CE) provides customers with powerful integration tools to leverage investments across their security posture.

Learn about Cloud Exchange
Aerial view of a city
  • Security Service Edge chevron

    Protect against advanced and cloud-enabled threats and safeguard data across all vectors.

  • SD-WAN chevron

    Confidently provide secure, high-performance access to every remote user, device, site, and cloud.

  • Secure Access Service Edge chevron

    Netskope One SASE provides a cloud-native, fully-converged and single-vendor SASE solution.

The platform of the future is Netskope

Security Service Edge (SSE), Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB), Cloud Firewall, Next Generation Secure Web Gateway (SWG), and Private Access for ZTNA built natively into a single solution to help every business on its journey to Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) architecture.

Go to Products Overview
Netskope video
Next Gen SASE Branch is hybrid — connected, secured, and automated

Netskope Next Gen SASE Branch converges Context-Aware SASE Fabric, Zero-Trust Hybrid Security, and SkopeAI-powered Cloud Orchestrator into a unified cloud offering, ushering in a fully modernized branch experience for the borderless enterprise.

Learn about Next Gen SASE Branch
People at the open space office
SASE Architecture For Dummies

Get your complimentary copy of the only guide to SASE design you’ll ever need.

Get the eBook
SASE Architecture For Dummies eBook
Make the move to market-leading cloud security services with minimal latency and high reliability.

Learn about NewEdge
Lighted highway through mountainside switchbacks
Safely enable the use of generative AI applications with application access control, real-time user coaching, and best-in-class data protection.

Learn how we secure generative AI use
Safely Enable ChatGPT and Generative AI
Zero trust solutions for SSE and SASE deployments

Learn about Zero Trust
Boat driving through open sea
Netskope achieves FedRAMP High Authorization

Choose Netskope GovCloud to accelerate your agency’s transformation.

Learn about Netskope GovCloud
Netskope GovCloud
  • Resources chevron

    Learn more about how Netskope can help you secure your journey to the cloud.

  • Blog chevron

    Learn how Netskope enables security and networking transformation through secure access service edge (SASE)

  • Events and Workshops chevron

    Stay ahead of the latest security trends and connect with your peers.

  • Security Defined chevron

    Everything you need to know in our cybersecurity encyclopedia.

Security Visionaries Podcast

2025 Predictions
In this episode of Security Visionaries, we're joined by Kiersten Todt, President at Wondros and former Chief of Staff for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to discuss predictions for 2025 and beyond.

Play the podcast Browse all podcasts
2025 Predictions
Latest Blogs

Read how Netskope can enable the Zero Trust and SASE journey through secure access service edge (SASE) capabilities.

Read the blog
Sunrise and cloudy sky
SASE Week 2024 On-Demand

Learn how to navigate the latest advancements in SASE and zero trust and explore how these frameworks are adapting to address cybersecurity and infrastructure challenges

Explore sessions
SASE Week 2024
What is SASE?

Learn about the future convergence of networking and security tools in today’s cloud dominant business model.

Learn about SASE
  • Company chevron

    We help you stay ahead of cloud, data, and network security challenges.

  • Careers chevron

    Join Netskope's 3,000+ amazing team members building the industry’s leading cloud-native security platform.

  • Customer Solutions chevron

    We are here for you and with you every step of the way, ensuring your success with Netskope.

  • Training and Accreditations chevron

    Netskope training will help you become a cloud security expert.

Supporting sustainability through data security

Netskope is proud to participate in Vision 2045: an initiative aimed to raise awareness on private industry’s role in sustainability.

Find out more
Supporting Sustainability Through Data Security
Help shape the future of cloud security

At Netskope, founders and leaders work shoulder-to-shoulder with their colleagues, even the most renowned experts check their egos at the door, and the best ideas win.

Join the team
Careers at Netskope
Netskope dedicated service and support professionals will ensure you successful deploy and experience the full value of our platform.

Go to Customer Solutions
Netskope Professional Services
Secure your digital transformation journey and make the most of your cloud, web, and private applications with Netskope training.

Learn about Training and Certifications
Group of young professionals working

Blogspot Serves as a COVID-19 Scamming Hotspot

Aug 26 2020

Attackers were quick to exploit the COVID-19 pandemic, with coronavirus-themed phishing campaigns, Trojans delivering ransomware and backdoors, and other scams. Netskope Threat Labs have been keeping a close eye on the threat landscape and tracking COVID-related campaigns throughout this unprecedented time.

This blog post details a COVID-19 relief package scam that has been active since April 2020. The attacker has recently registered new domains from which they are hosting the scam. The attacker’s use of social media—leveraging victims to actively share the scam with their contacts—has contributed to the scam’s longevity. Every version of the scam is based on the same template, helping the attacker to pivot to new cloud services and hosting providers when necessary. The attacker behind this campaign has hosted multiple similar scams, each targeting victims in specific countries, with some of its infrastructure hosted in Google’s Blogger service on blogspot.com. This post provides a breakdown of the scam and the blogger profiles behind it. 

Background

During August 2020, Netskope Threat Labs discovered two newly registered domains—https://fundzforcovid19[.]com and https://fundsforcovid19[.]com—being shared in WhatsApp messages. Both the websites presented a fake Government Lockdown Funds page as shown in Figure 1.

Screenshot showing Fake Government Lockdown Funds page
Figure 1: Fake Government Lockdown Funds page

The webpage shared similarities to the news published by The Quint in May 2020: a viral message floating around on WhatsApp claiming that the government is giving a “free” relief fund of Rs 5,000 to each Indian citizen amid the coronavirus lockdown.

During our analysis, we discovered this scam was also being spread through Facebook, and that the attackers responsible have launched similar variants targeting victims in different countries, including Egypt, Ghana, India, Kenya, Malaysia, Nigeria, South Africa, and Uganda.

We tied these attacks together based on the template and a profile hosting scam pages in Google’s Blogger service on blogspot.com. 

Analysis

The longevity of this scam can be attributed to its use of social media. It is primarily distributed via forwards on Facebook and WhatsApp, like the message shown in Figure 2. In the week before posting this blog, I myself received messages like this from 10 different contacts in WhatsApp.

Screenshot of a WhatsApp forward of the scam
Figure 2: WhatsApp forward of the scam

Upon visiting the website, https://fundzforcovid19[.]com, the victim is presented with a Government Lockdown Funds page with this message, “This offer is limited only till 2 25th of August .. Hurry!! So far 105314 users have received their Rs.5,000 Lockdown.” The message contained a typo, “till 2 25th August,” and the user’s number was incrementally randomized with a counter timer. The date is static, indicating the attacker will likely alter the text after the 25th passes.

The victim then fills out a short questionnaire and is prompted to share the message to WhatsApp groups using the “Share Now” option to claim the money as shown in Figure 3.

Screenshot showing message shoowing
Figure 3: Messages displayed on visiting https://fundzforcovid19[.]com

The page also displays fake Facebook messages that users have received the money in their bank account. This message has to be shared across WhatsApp groups to receive the cash, thus continuing the spread of this scam 

The sharing is invoked via the function var walink = “whatsapp://send?text=”+WhatsApp_share_message+Share_link. Upon sharing more than 9 times, the victim is presented with another webpage, https://fundsforcovid19[.]com/2.html?, as shown in Figure 4.

Screenshot showing code redirecting victim to https://fundsforcovid19[.]com/2.html?
Figure 4: Victim redirected to https://fundsforcovid19[.]com/2.html?

On visiting the new website, the victim is presented with a message to input the account number and the bank as shown in Figure 5.

Screenshot showing message displayed on visiting  https://fundsforcovid19[.]com/2.html?
Figure 5: Message displayed on visiting https://fundsforcovid19[.]com/2.html?

On entering the details and clicking on the “Claim Now” option, the victim is directed to the website, http://itnuzleafan[.]com/4/3317123, which serves up unwanted ads but does not store the victim’s credentials. The scam appears to be solely to collect ad revenue and not to phish for bank account numbers.  

Attacker’s details in the webpages

We discovered 42 similar scam themes targeting different regions and identified two interesting details in the source of the webpage. 

The first one was the usage of the Google Forms page in the website for people who wanted to buy the script used in the scam as shown in Figure 6.

Screenshot showing Blogger profiles in the webpage source
Figure 6: Blogger profiles in the webpage source

Upon visiting the profiles, we identified the blogger profile, https://www.blogger[.]com/profile/12159650279331051658, hosted multiple similar scams as shown in Figure 7.