AI Fuels Surge in Online Shopping Scams During Sales Season

Online shopping scams have significantly increased during the November sales season, which includes events like Chinese Singles' Day, Cyber Monday, and Black Friday. This year, the threat has escalated due to artificial intelligence, which has made creating fraudulent websites and phishing campaigns much faster and more accessible. Ovad Meshulam, Head of Defense Systems at the National Cyber Directorate, reported a 41% rise in scams and phishing campaigns compared to previous years. The directorate handled nearly 90,000 phishing campaigns and citizen complaints this year.

Meshulam explained that AI has drastically reduced the time needed to create a fake shopping website. Previously, setting up a convincing replica of a legitimate site took about 16 hours, but now it can be done in just five minutes. The technical skill required from scammers has also decreased, as AI tools can now generate functional fake websites upon request. This makes online fraud more accessible to a wider range of criminals and harder for consumers to detect.

"You simply cannot know" if a fake site is legitimate, Meshulam stated, emphasizing the difficulty in distinguishing them. However, he advised that consumers can still shop online safely by adhering to basic precautions. The primary recommendation is to avoid clicking on links in messages, even if they appear to come from known contacts, as these can be compromised. Instead, users should manually type website addresses into their browser or search for them on Google.

Regarding payments, Meshulam urged consumers not to enter credit card details directly on shopping sites. He suggested using secure, well-known payment services like PayPal, Google Pay, or Apple Pay, which act as intermediaries, preventing direct exposure of credit card information to the shopping site. He also advised against saving credit card details on any website after entering them. Furthermore, enabling two-factor authentication on services like WhatsApp and Facebook is recommended as an additional layer of security.

Meshulam concluded that while AI enables rapid creation of fraudulent sites, making even cautious shoppers vulnerable, consumers should not abandon online shopping. He advised assuming that encountering at least one fake website during the sales month is likely and to maintain vigilance by following these safety guidelines.