A new Vitale card scam targets its victims by SMS: what you need to know

It’s a rather well-crafted scam that has already targeted millions of French people for several months. A simple SMS invites you to update or renew your Vitale card. By clicking on the link, you come to a website that is very similar to that of the Health Insurance. You are then asked for your address in order to send you, supposedly, your new Vitale card. But to receive it, you have to pay a few euros. The crooks thus recover your credit card numbers and can puncture your account.

Carte Vitale scams had already been reported by Health Insurance via e-mails. This trap by SMS, which has been circulating a lot since December, is the second most widespread scam currently in France, according to the platform in charge of assistance to victims of cyber-maliciousness. Princess Diarra is one of the millions of French people scammed: “They asked me for my bank details and to pay 84 cents. Afterwards I had no further news. I told myself that I should have been much more vigilant.” Fortunately for her, her bank warned her of these dubious transfers, and blocked them. But others were not so lucky and lost several hundred euros.

The crooks go so far as to call the victims, pretending to be their banker, explains Jean-Jacques Latour, director of expertise for the victim assistance platform cybermalveillance.gouv.fr: “The scammer will have all the information to be able to make his attack credible. He will call you, tell you ‘You are Mr. or Mrs. so and so who lives in such a place and who has such a bank card number‘. And there, announcing fraud on his bank card, the victim is put in confidence. She will be able to give in to the various manipulations that the cybercriminal will make her do.”

A reminder not to be ripped off: Health Insurance will never ask you by message to update your Vitale card. This is done in pharmacies, on specific terminals, and completely free of charge and never on the internet.