According to Compliance Week, a renowned news, analysis, and information resource publisher in the US, when more companies worldwide are driving staff to hunker down from home to ward off the spread of coronavirus, people are advised to be watchful of online fraudsters.

As a way to prevent the coronavirus, companies all over the world have facilitated employees to work off-site, while hackers are seeing this as an opportunity to steal account numbers, passwords, and other important information.

“This is a moment that a lot of hackers across the world have been preparing for,” stated Brian Finch, partner at Pillsbury law firm and co-leader of the company’s coronavirus response team. According to Compliance Week, “This is an opportunity to conduct pretty robust cyber-espionage, if not cyber-hostage taking. We are already seeing a spike in cyberattacks, including on remote connection services.”

A UK report by epidemiologists predicts the supply of intensive care hospital beds would be hampered by coronavirus. The report—not yet published in a peer-reviewed journal—was released by the London Imperial College COVID-19 Response Team on Monday (March 16). The team advised the UK government on its response strategy.

In a National Center for State Courts’ (NCSC) post, Paul Chichester, the NCSC Director of Operations said, “We know that cybercriminals are opportunistic and will look to exploit people’s fears, and this has undoubtedly been the case with the coronavirus outbreak.” He also stated, “If someone does fall victim to a phishing attempt, they should look to report this to Action Fraud as soon as possible.”

Compliance Week reported that the US Attorney General William Barr conveyed to all the US Attorneys General in a Monday internal memo, “The pandemic is dangerous enough without wrongdoers seeking to profit from public panic, and this sort of conduct cannot be tolerated.”

Digital retailers need to be alert about fraud centering around the deadly coronavirus because it is now making its way around the world.

According to Forbes, Amazon has withdrawn more than 1 million virus related items that have tried to make false statements. Dharmesh Mehta, Amazon’s Worldwide Customer Trust Vice President, said there were tens of thousands of other companies still seeking to price-gouge consumers.