Mastodawn

JoannaStern Feb 25, 2023

Something crazy is happening around the U.S. Thieves are stealing people's #iphones AND their entire digital and financial lives.

How do they do it? They're watching for passcodes.

@nicolenguyen and I spent the last few months investigating how one string of numbers can unlock your whole life.

Don't use your passcode in public! And change to an alphanumeric passcode!

Story: https://on.wsj.com/3SuLFvy
YouTube video: https://bit.ly/3EGdwmK
Advice for you + Apple: https://on.wsj.com/41meP3V

A Basic iPhone Feature Helps Criminals Steal Your Entire Digital Life

The passcode that unlocks your phone can give thieves access to your money and data; ‘it’s like a treasure box’

WSJ

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Ricardo Brenelli Feb 25, 2023

@joannastern here in Brazil they do this to everyone, Android too, but they hold you at gunpoint and make you tell them your pin. Or, they just snag it out of your hands while you're distracted texting by the sidewalk and keep the phone unlocked while they work on it, without knowing your pin, they just use SMS and Gmail to reset passwords. Then they take advantage of the instant payments all Brazilian banks must offer and transfer large sums out of people's accounts.

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JoannaStern

@rbrenelli I had read about Brazil crimes like this when reporting. It’s part of what made me start to be convinced it was the passcode. (Law enforcement and victims didn’t quite know when I first started the reporting.) Had no idea they were doing this with unlocked phones too

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Ricardo Brenelli Feb 26, 2023

@joannastern This report from the BBC explains it. Desktop YouTube will translate the official subtitles provided by the BBC to English.

https://youtu.be/H573VW6kCDw

And this has some shots of how the criminals act (but no subs). They will break your car window if isn't open and grab it from the dashboard if you're using it for gps (or texting and driving). They get it on metro stations as the doors are closing and they get it on the street on bikes etc.

https://youtu.be/e_qvqFEPw3o

Como agem os ladrões e o que fazer se celular for roubado

YouTube

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Ricardo Brenelli Feb 26, 2023

@joannastern here people who have some cash in their savings account are either buying a cheap phone just to have their banking apps installed (and they keep it at home exclusively) or instead of passing down an older phone they keep it for this purpose. Banks are having to contend with it too. My bank has a "street mode" if I'm not connected to home WiFi it imposes limits and asks for facial recognition for anything above a x$ (it uses the photo ID you submitted when you opened the account).