Israel warns of phishing attack using fake Facebook pages

Israel's National Cyber Directorate (INCD) on Friday issued a warning about a phishing attack using fake Facebook support and service pages to steal personal information and hack into Facebook accounts.

The phishing attack aimed primarily at users who post Facebook ads to promote small and medium businesses, it said.

The hackers impersonated Facebook in a way that is difficult to identify, which includes using fake pages titled "support update account" and threatening the victims with disconnection from Facebook.

In this way, the hackers forced the Facebook users to pass on personal account information to them, which allowed access into the users' Facebook accounts and steal their identity.

Israel's National Cyber Event Readiness Team at the INCD said that "the phishing pages posted messages tagging official Israeli business pages, urging them to verify the account details through a link provided, otherwise their account will be shut down."

Clicking the links took the victims to an alleged Facebook login pages where they were required to enter their username and password, it said.

The INCD has also issued guidelines for business owners to protect them from phishing attacks, including raising employees' awareness through periodic tutorials, avoiding the use of email links to connect to Facebook, and upgrading security setups in the Facebook profile.

The Israeli news website "ynet" reported that after it informed Facebook about the problem, the fake pages were removed.

The INCD is responsible for all aspects of Israel's cyber defense in the civilian sphere, from formulating policy and building technological power to operational defense in cyberspace.