THE Bureau of Immigration (BI) and the country’s flag carrier, Philippine Airlines (PAL), recently fell victim to tech fraudsters.
PAL spokesperson Ma. Cielo Villaluna has warned the public against dealing with fake PAL sites.
She said unscrupulous individuals created bogus Facebook sites announcing the airline has a P168 flight promo.
As if this was not enough, she said there are other fake FB sites, announcing that PAL is selling suitcases worth P110.
Ms. Cielo is asking the public to never engage with these fake sites as doing so would compromise their personal data.
“We do not condone these illegal acts and have taken steps to take down these accounts,” she assures.
As a reminder and for the public’s protection, she stressed that PAL issues official announcements, including flight promotional ads using the PAL website http://www.philippineairlines.com and the official PAL FB Page.
Flight bookings may also be carried out via PAL Website, PAL Reservations Hotline (02) 8855-8888, official PAL Facebook, Viber, WhatsApp and myPAL Webchat.
If you opt to book via PAL Facebook, Viber, WhatsApp and myPAL Webchat, a link will be provided to you where you can transact.
Given this, she is encouraging the public to inform PAL of any questionable social media account using the airline’s name by contacting 028855 – 8888 (PAL Hotline) or by emailing PAL at [email protected].
About a couple of days before this, the Bureau of Immigration also fell victim to this kind of tech scam.
No less than BI Commissioner Norman Tansingco warned the public against falling prey to the proliferation of scam accounts on social media using the bureau itself.
His office received reports of email accounts and social media pages extorting unsuspecting people in the guise of being official pages.
In February, he received information about an email address sending invoices requesting P25,000 for a supposed package from Japan that was being held for release.
He then received a similar complaint, extorting the victims P3,000 for the release of a package from Syria.
In another complaint reported to him, a victim was being asked for P20,000 to release a luggage being held at the airport.
A highly-irked Tansingco clarified that BI is not in any way connected to the release of parcels or cargoes.
It can be recalled that sometime in 2022, the BI inked a coordination agreement with the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC) to strengthen efforts against cybercrimes.
The BI Chief said that concerned units have forwarded the details of the cases to the CICC for investigation. So, there!
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