[Notice] Response to Suspicious Site Guidance Methods Using Browser Notification Functions

Dear all,

Have you ever received the following suspicious notifications while using a terminal?

• A virus has been detected.
• Your computer has been affected by a suspicious program.
• To remove the virus, click here.

If you have, there is a good chance that you have fallen for a phishing scam that uses the notification feature to lure you to a phishing site. Even if you don’t see it, it is strongly recommended to be aware of browser notifications and to set up workarounds to prevent them.

Basically, ignore or reject “Allow Notifications”

When you are accessing a website, it sometimes asks you to “allow notifications”. This is used when you want your device to be notified about the information on a website, but it is also often used to induce malicious notifications to sites that are designed to infect users with malware or expose them to illegal methods. If you allow it easily, you may get frequent notifications on your screen directing you to phishing sites. Therefore, please ignore or reject it unless you clearly want to allow it.

Reference: Browser push notifications: a feature asking to be abused (Malwarebytes Labs)

How to set your browser to avoid “Allow Notifications”.

Each web browser has different settings, so please refer to the following site to set the settings for each browser.

Reference: How to get rid of suspicious browser notifications on your computer (Trend Micro co.)

Regards,
Information Processing Office.