In addition to those little silicone things that allow you to attach Zoom and hand sanitizer bottles to the zipper of your fanny pack, one of the technologies Covid has introduced into our lives is the QR code. By now we’ve all been used to using them for Venmo friends, tipping people without physical contact, and logging into our workstations remotely. We got used to using them to order drinks and food in restaurants and then we got bored of it.

So it makes sense for hackers to start using them as well. According to cybersecurity firm Cofense, an unnamed major US energy company has been hit by a phishing attack using QR codes attached to emails.

The alleged phishing emails from Microsoft instructed recipients to scan the attached QR codes to review their security requirements and update their accounts. In fact, scan codes landed on sites designed to steal their information. The codes allowed phishing messages to evade email security filters looking for known malicious links.

They also bypass our own human protection filters at some level. Of course, QR codes predate the pandemic; They have appeared in food packaging and bus stop advertisements. But they seemed a bit of a gimmick, and most people didn’t have to rely on them in their day-to-day lives. I remember downloading a QR scanner app for my smartphone and maybe using it once.

In other words, a phishing email with a QR code sent in 2019 will look strange and suspicious. They have now become a Pavlovian sign that prompts us to mindlessly reach for our phones.

I’m not a fan of QR codes. Part of it is that I hate looking at a screen and manipulating it to order nachos from the person standing in front of me.

But on the other hand, it’s just another example of the distorted presentation of information that I had to interpret with the device. It’s like living in a country where I don’t speak the language and the only thing that speaks the language is a computer. Now this confirms my worst suspicions that messages with code are sometimes malicious lies.

Apparently, QR codes were invented to mark and track car parts. This seems like a really good idea. Let’s not use them for anything else. Source