Hacking of business phone systems can result in phone bills of thousands of Euros. In these incidents, hackers exploit security weaknesses in the phone system to generate numerous calls to high cost international or premium rate numbers. These incidents often occur when business are closed, over weekends or holiday periods and may occur due to a lack of adequate security on the phone system.
Some simple steps can improve the security of a phone system:
- Use complex passwords for administrative access to the system and also for voicemail access (avoiding defaults such as 0000 or 1234). Simple passwords are easy for hackers to guess.
- Block premium rate calls and international calls if these are not required.
- Turn off remote access features on the phone system if these are not used (e.g. remote voicemail access or remote administrative access).
A business that is concerned about the their phone system’s security should contact their phone system maintainer. A business that has been a victim of an incident should:
- Contact their phone system maintainer to review or update system security and block calls.
- Report the incident to a local Garda station.
- Contact their phone service provider to advise them of the incident and provide the Garda Report number.
