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12/6/13, "Phishing Scam Reported for DC Health Link," RollCall.com, By
Niels Lesniewski and Hannah Hess, 3:48 p.m.
"Congressional members and staff need to be on the lookout for a
phishing scam as they seek to sign up for health insurance through the
DC Health Link portal.
That was the advice Friday of DC Health Link spokesman Richard
Sorian after receiving a report that a link to recover lost passwords
was leading to a site seeking debit card numbers and personal
identification numbers as identity verification, something no legitimate
site would ask for.
Phishing involves deceiving users into thinking they are
providing personal information to a secure entity, when they’re really
giving it directly to scammers. CQ Roll Call received news of the scam
attempt from one staffer who encountered the fraudulent site after
repeated failed attempts to log in to what the user believed to be the
legitimate system.
“I tried the ‘forgot password’ function. After about 15
attempts with that, I was finally taken to a forgot password page. On
that page I was asked for my check card number and my ATM pin,” the
congressional aide said.
“I was fairly confident this was a scam, so I called customer
service. After a 103-minute hold time, I was told that this was indeed a
scam,” the tipster said. “Hopefully the very kind customer service lady
alerted tech support.”
Sorian said in an email that while DC Health Link couldn’t
confirm a specific incident, he pointed to a document on the website
warning that scammers might try to take advantage of those using the
website."
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