A Naked Security reader in the UK alerted us to a scam they received this afternoon in a text message.
The message claimed to come from the NHS, Britain’s National Health Service, which administers coronavirus vaccinations and provides free testing throughout the country:
As you probably know, PCR tests, which currently require processing in a laboratory, are considered more accurate than self-administered lateral flow tests.
Indeed, PCR tests are both advised and free in the UK if you already have coronavirus symptoms, or have been in contact with someone who’s infectious.
You can have a one-off test set sent through the mail, and post the completed test out to the lab for processing, but that adds time until you get the result – and if the test is positive but you don’t yet have any symptoms, that in turn adds time to your mandatory isolation period.
So, as you can imagine, for anyone who is self-employed but who needs to be out and about for their job – plumbers, electricians, care workers, painters and dozens of other professions – a home testing device that could reduce the time to receive a trustworthy result would be very useful.
We have no idea if such a consumer device could affordably be made, and if so whether the results could reliably and securely be validated online, but in a world in which retail companies can deliver esoteric products to your doorstep within hours and securely receive payment, in which telephones include high-resolution…
