Google warns about global ‘smishing’ ring stealing millions via text scams, files lawsuit in US

Google on Wednesday announced that it has filed a lawsuit against a foreign cybercriminal organisation behind a series of SMS phishing attacks, or “smishing”. In a blog post, the tech giant said that the bad actors built a phishing-as-a-service operation called “Lighthouse” to generate and deploy large-scale attacks.

Google also warned that these attacks exploit established brands like E-Z Pass to steal people’s financial information.

How does the scam work?

According to Google, cybercriminals send users a text message containing a link that…