Ewhaians have been the victim of voice phishing trials recently. Phone calls have been made to the school’s phone line demanding faculty and staff members from various departments, including the Office of Personnel Management, to pay 1,800,000 won to an account at Kookmin Bank.
  Voice phishing is a criminally fraudulent process that attempts to acquire sensitive information like personal identification, passwords and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity such as the National Pension Service, a court, post offices and police stations through phone calls.
  With numerous cases of voice phishing crimes in society, the Korea Information Security Agency has carried out prevention programs and investigations since 2000.
  Kim Chang-yeoun, a staff member from the Office of General Administration, said that there have been a number of reports especially among staff members about voice phishing through phone calls to the school offices.
  “I got a call once where a mechanical voice requires you to input private information such as personal identification numbers and account numbers,” said Kim. “Voice phishing is a type of spam call. Since it is done through fake numbers, it is impossible to stop it. However, the school asked KT, the telephone company Ewha uses, to do its best to alleviate the problem that Ewha is facing at the moment.”
  According to the guidelines published by KISA, since voice phishing calls target both cell phone users and wire phone users, all of the phone users must pay attention to their private information. No public organizations, including Ewha, demand payments or personal information through phone calls. Thus, if such calls are received, users should hang up and report the calling line identification to investigation agencies, such as the police agency, prosecutor’s office and the KISA.
  The Office of General Administration posted notification about numerous cases of voice phishing and requested careful response from students and staffs on the official Ewha homepage in April.
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