A new type of fraud, known as "ghost package," is being used by criminals in Mexico City, posing as employees of courier companies to obtain personal data or money from users. According to ESET, a cybersecurity company, fraudulent calls have been detected from several states in the country, including the State of Mexico, Veracruz, Hidalgo, Jalisco, and Nuevo León.
Scammers contact victims informing them of a supposed problem with the delivery of a package and, through deception, request confidential information such as card numbers, addresses, or WhatsApp verification codes. The companies most impersonated in this fraudulent scheme are Amazon, DHL, Mercado Libre, and postal services such as Estafeta or FedEx.
According to David González, a security researcher at ESET Latin America, once the victim falls into the trap, the criminals request deposits to release the package or steal their credentials to carry out fraudulent transactions. This strategy aims to access sensitive information from users and make illegal transactions.
The Citizen Council of Mexico City has recorded a 222% increase in "ghost package" cases. Frauds are mainly conducted via phone calls (71%), followed by text messages (14%), WhatsApp (10%), Facebook (2%), and email (1%). The economic impact of these scams is considerable, with amounts ranging from up to 10,000 pesos to more than 50,000 pesos. Additionally, in 25% of the cases, the scammers obtain the victim's WhatsApp security code, facilitating extortion of their contacts.
As a recommendation to avoid falling for these types of scams, ESET advises not to trust messages requesting money to release a package, not to share WhatsApp verification codes with third parties, to identify grammatical errors in suspicious messages, and to track packages only on official courier company websites. It is also recommended to enable two-step verification on messaging apps and to download the app "No more Extortions" from the Citizen Council of CDMX, which blocks more than 600,000 numbers related to fraud and extortion.
