When the text message first popped up on his phone he could not believe it. It looked like something out of Squid Game. There it was, his car with his real license plate, parked in front of a local strip club.
The message that accompanied the photo was even more ominous.
“Hello, I want to play a game. YOU have been a bad little boy. Nobody has to see this picture. It would be a shame if it was sent to you know who…. Send $1,000 by midnight tonight and it will go away quietly and you will never hear from us again.”
The only problem is that he had never been to a strip club in his life. But the car that was in the photo was the same make and model as his car, and the license plate number was really his.
He was a victim a new rising genre of hyperrealistic scams called “DataSniper Scams” where breached data is being used to extort people for millions.
How Did They Get His Information For Such A Realistic Text?
The victim, who posted his experience on Reddit, was shocked. How could the scammers get his information.
Based on the text message they must have been able to piece together all of this information.
- His phone number
- His car make and model
- His license plate
- The color of his car
The answer is suprisingly simple – data breaches.
High profile breaches from CDK Global (which impacted 15,000 dealerships) could have been the source. Or perhaps other recent breaches like Volkswagen, Hertz, or Avis. They have all had breaches over the last two years involving personal and vehicle information.
But the data might now always originate from breaches. In many cases this data can be purchased in bulk from data brokers too.
On Telegram for example services called TLO Bots offer personal information to scammers for as little as .25 cents a record.
DataSniper Scams Are Rising And They Are Scary
DataSniper scams first emerged last year and flooded peoples inboxes. It was called the “Gmail Search History Scam”, and it shocked many people because they thought scammers knew where they lived and were going to come and visit them.
In that scheme, scammers sent victims a photo of their home with the subject line “I am watching your dirty behavior online”. The scheme shocked people because the scammer knew their email addresses and where they lived.
I would know because I got one of the gmail messages myself with the subject line – “We Are Watching You”.
This is what it looked like. 👇
The Next Evolution In Scams Is Already Here
These data sniping trend represents a new evolution in scam tactics.
By combining real personal information with fake evidence, scammers create urgent scenarios that feel authentic enough to bypass victims’ natural skepticism about scam messages.
The rise of artificial intelligence tools like Adobe Generative Fill and ChatGPT image creation are going to make these scams even more realistic and far more common.
