Re­pub­lic Bank Lim­it­ed is in­form­ing the pub­lic of the fraud­u­lent What­sApp mes­sages in cir­cu­la­tion. Re­pub­lic Bank is urg­ing the pub­lic to re­frain from click­ing on any links, re­ply­ing to mes­sages or down­load­ing any items sur­round­ing this scam. De­tails fol­low in this press re­lease from RBL:

Re­pub­lic Bank Lim­it­ed would like to ad­vise all mem­bers of the pub­lic that there have been fraud­u­lent What­sApp mes­sages in cir­cu­la­tion which in­clude the unau­tho­rized use of our lo­go and web­site.

These mes­sages ap­pear to be a Re­pub­lic Bank pro­mo­tion and when the links are ac­cessed, users are re-di­rect­ed to a sep­a­rate web­site to pro­vide per­son­al de­tails and qual­i­fy for a chance to win a cash prize.

“Re­pub­lic Bank Lim­it­ed urges per­sons to re­frain from click­ing on any links, re­ply­ing to mes­sages or down­load­ing any items sur­round­ing this scam. Even if the link looks le­git­i­mate, we can con­firm that it is a phish­ing link,” said Sher­win Forte, Man­ag­er Cor­po­rate Se­cu­ri­ty. He adds that cus­tomers and the gen­er­al pub­lic should al­ways go to a com­pa­ny’s web­site and so­cial me­dia pages to ver­i­fy and au­then­ti­cate any such cash pro­mo­tions. “These scam­mers are cre­at­ing fic­ti­tious web­sites, de­ceiv­ing cus­tomers and steal­ing their bank­ing in­for­ma­tion. We would like to re­mind cus­tomers that the Bank and oth­er rep­utable com­pa­nies would nev­er ask for sen­si­tive and con­fi­den­tial in­for­ma­tion us­ing this chan­nel.”

For per­sons who clicked on the link, do not an­swer any of the ques­tions and if de­tails have al­ready been sub­mit­ted, scan your phone for any mal­ware us­ing the fol­low­ing steps:

For An­droid de­vices:

1.       Go to the Google Play Store app.

2.       Tap the menu but­ton.

3.       Next, tap on Play Pro­tect.

4.       Tap the scan but­ton to force your An­droid de­vice to check for mal­ware.

5.       If you see any harm­ful apps on your de­vice, you will re­ceive an op­tion to re­move it.

For iOS de­vices:

Due to se­cu­ri­ty re­stric­tions on iOS de­vices, it is im­pos­si­ble for any app to scan the sys­tem or oth­er apps for mal­ware. How­ev­er, it is rec­om­mend­ed to restart the phone.

Cus­tomers are al­so ad­vised that they should re­port the con­tact to What­sApp when the mes­sage is re­ceived.