In November 2024, the State Police recorded 11 cases of telephone scams involving at least € 10,000 and even larger sums of money, Latvian Television reported on December 5.
To fight these fraudsters, mobile operators as well as the Cyber Incident Response Team CERT.LV come to the rescue.
CERT’s cyber security expert Armīns Palms explained that the ” DNA Firewall ” app can protect against fraudulent calls and prevent access to malicious websites: “We check the phone number and if it turns out to be fraudulent, we put it on a list, so that if a fraudster tries to call a user who uses the ‘DNA Firewall’ app, he will not be able to reach him. The user will be able to see that the number tried to call them.”
Mobile operators also use different security solutions. Tele2 has introduced a system that monitors calls coming from abroad while they are shown to the customer as coming from Latvia.
“In the first two weeks, we see that 50-100 fraudulent calls are blocked in one hour. We also have an ‘internet security’ service that helps customers against various malware. It protects against various phishing schemes. In the last month, this service has prevented about 11 million threats to our customers,” said Oskars Fīrmanis, Tele2 spokesman.
Tele2 has also blocked around 200,000 fraudulent text messages this year. Mobile operator Bite has blocked 150,000 fraudulent calls this year.
“For the time being, the operator can only fight its own customers. If a Bite customer calls a Bite customer, we can check. It’s very simple, efficient, and works well. But these calls also come from other operators or interconnections, we cannot verify them,” said Reinis Pudāns, Head of Internal Security Processes at Bite Latvija.
The company also said that since October, the intensity of scam calls has increased significantly. “[Other countries] are starting to block the numbers of fraudsters, and then they choose the countries where it is easier to call. Unfortunately, Latvia is one of the easiest places to make these calls.”
Neither a “DNA firewall” nor mobile phone operators will ever protect 100 percent against scammers, experts say, so no personal data should ever be given away over a phone call.
