Public alerted as scammers pose as Police, GovPay

Fake text messages misusing the name of the Sri Lanka Police are being circulated, misleading the public to pay fines for speeding violations.

Security forces requested the public to remain highly vigilant as this fraudulent activity is spreading rapidly, targeting mobile phone users across the country over the past few days.

Organised scammers created phishing websites with interfaces highly similar to the official government 'GovPay' website, attempting to deceive the public and steal their bank cards and personal information. The correct address of the official government GovPay website is govpay.lk or govpay.lk/en/, and all official government websites always operate under the official government gov.lk domain name.

Scammers are sending text messages containing completely different and highly suspicious fake internet addresses such as 998809.help/govpay/lk. Information technology experts pointed out a severe risk of money being stolen from bank accounts if individuals access such fake links and enter confidential bank card numbers (CVV/CVC), one-time passwords (OTP) received for financial transactions, or other sensitive personal data.

The Police Media Division requested the public to pause and thoroughly check the reliability and URL address before clicking on any internet link received via SMS, and to refrain from providing bank or personal information to unverified websites under any circumstances.