Kickass Torrents Community Targeted with Phishing Scam

KickassTorrents community targeted with phishing scam — This shows you can trust every link you click

Last year HackRead revealed breathtaking stats exposing how torrenting websites are earning millions of dollars annually yet spending nothing on security and dropping malware on users’ PC. We also talked about how Fallout 4 fans were tricked into downloading a fake copy the game from a torrent site which was actually a malware stealing Bitcoin from their PCs. Now, Google Chrome was found blocking KickassTorrent domain because the browser’s phishing detector feature found of phishing link on the community page.

Though often illegal, many people commit piracy in an effort to avoid the high cost of entertainment in the modern world. However, this practice is becoming more and more dangerous for unsuspecting users. The increasing tendency of malicious actors using popular torrent platforms has certainly become a nuisance for security experts and users alike. The recent incident is a clear example of how easily scammers can deceive the public.

On Tuesday, the Internet was abuzz with the news that popular pirated movie torrent site Kickass Torrents’ web community has been officially stamped as unsafe by Chrome and Firefox and is apparently shut down. Movie lovers and loyal visitors of Kickass Torrents were naturally disturbed.

It was learned on Wednesday that cyber criminals had posted a phishing link on its user community and hence, Google had to intervene to save users from being tricked by the scammers.

This was followed by a web forgery alert from Firefox on the main page of Kickass Torrents. The statement read: “web forgeries are designed to trick you into revealing personal or financial information by imitating sources you may trust. Entering any information on this web page may result in identity theft or other fraud.”

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Both the browsers started alerting users visiting Kat.cr and stated that they have detected a “Deceptive Site,” and Google announced that “attackers on kat.cr may trick you into doing something dangerous like installing software or revealing your personal information (for example, passwords, phone numbers, or credit cards).”

This incident reminds us about the rapidly thinning layer of internet safety on trusted platforms such as Facebook where a majority of content is shared via trusted friends but even then scammers are able to conduct successful phish scams. Kickass Torrents users also use the site considering it safe and secure but it has become evident that no platform is safe nowadays as malicious links can arrive in any form and style. All that these malicious actors need is a loophole or crack in the security practices.

It is important to improve security at platforms that are overwhelmingly used and trusted by users around the world. According to Kickass Torrents team, they are improving users’ security by “wrapping every external link in confirmation window and this time Google alert is referring to a wrapped link that has been posted in our community.”

“We’ve blocked that site thus rendering those external links unusable. We’ve reported it to Google and expecting this security alert soon to be lifted,” they added.