Two investors lost over $550k in fake Futu Securities phishing attack

Two investors lost a combined total of over HK$550,000 after falling victim to a phishing scam involving fraudulent text messages masquerading as Futu Securities, according to a post on the police's "CyberDefender" social media page.

The post noted on Monday (July 6) that law enforcement authorities have received more than 20 reports of similar cases over the past two weeks, with cumulative losses exceeding HK$4 million.

Among the cases, the two victims received SMS messages that falsely claimed to be from Futu Securities and lacked the official "#" sender ID prefix.

The messages warned that the victim's "US withholding tax and declaration" was about to expire, and that failure to click an attached link would result in a withholding tax of up to 30 percent.
Upon clicking the link, the victims were redirected to a spoofed Futu Securities login page, where they were prompted to input sensitive credentials, including their account numbers and transaction passwords.

Both accounts were subsequently hijacked, and all stock holdings were liquidated the next morning. The proceeds were used to purchase several penny stocks, which plummeted by approximately 90 percent on the same day.

The victims only realized they had been defrauded after receiving official automated transaction alerts from Futu Securities, by which time they had suffered a combined loss of over HK$550,000.

In response, police reminded the public that Futu Securities International (Hong Kong) Limited has joined the SMS Sender Registration Scheme to combat phishing.

Under this scheme, all official SMS messages from the brokerage will feature a sender ID starting with the "#" symbol.

Police emphasized that Futu staff will never contact clients via unofficial WhatsApp accounts, establish WhatsApp investment groups, or request sensitive personal credentials and transaction passwords.

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