Mobile Carding 2026: Hacking in your pocket when your phone becomes a phishing hook and a crypto wallet at the same time.

[Professor]

Mobile carding: vulnerabilities in payment systems (Apple Pay/Google Pay) and banking apps.​

Mobile carding isn't just a port of classic schemes to a small screen. It's a fundamentally new threat that exploits the unique vulnerabilities of the mobile ecosystem: payment service integration, app trust, biometrics, and the device's always-online status. By 2026, the smartphone will no longer be a carding tool, but the primary arena and target for attack.

Vulnerabilities and Attack Vectors 2026​

1. Attacks on NFC payments (Apple Pay/Google Pay/Samsung Pay)

• Vulnerability: Not in Apple/Google Pay itself (which uses tokenization, which is safe), but in the process of setting them up (linking a card) and in the social engineering around them.
• Scenarios:
  • Linking data phishing: The user receives an SMS or email purportedly from the bank: "To activate Apple Pay, follow the link and confirm your details." The link leads to a phishing page that requests card details, CVV, and SMS codes — everything needed to add the card to someone else's Apple/Google Pay.
  • Banking app session theft: If an attacker has gained access to a mobile banking session (via stealer or phishing), they can add a card to their Apple Pay directly from the bank's app, as the bank considers them the "owner."
  • Attacking trusted devices: Linking a card often requires the device to be "trusted" for an Apple ID/Google account. Hacking the account allows the card to be added to a new phone.

2. Attacks on mobile banking applications (App-based Attacks)
This is the main vector of 2026.

• Banking Trojans (Android): A malicious app disguised as useful software (like a flashlight or PDF viewer) requests access to Accessibility Services. Once granted, the Trojan can:
  • Read SMS with confirmation codes (2FA).
  • Intercept push notifications from banks.
  • Change mobile banking windows on the fly, requesting PIN, CVV, and passwords.
  • Perform unauthorized transactions by automatically clicking buttons in the bank's interface.
  • Examples 2026: Cerberus, TeaBot, SharkBot modifications.
• iOS attacks (more complex, but possible):
  • Malicious configuration profiles (MDM): The user is tricked into installing a profile that gives control over the device, allows interception of traffic, or bypasses security.
  • Jailbreak Exploits: Using zero-day vulnerabilities to gain root access and install a banking trojan.
• API (Application Programming Interface) attacks: Instead of hacking an application, an attacker exploits vulnerabilities in the bank's API that the application accesses. This can allow operations to be performed without the application's protection.

3. Attacks on the execution environment and OS

• DNS substitution at the device or router level to direct mobile banking traffic to a phishing server.
• Keylogging via third-party keyboards with "full access" permission.
• Biometric attacks: Using 2D/3D masks or deepfakes to unlock Face ID devices. For fingerprints, collecting fingerprints from surfaces and creating fake ones ("gummy bear attacks").

4. SIM-swapping – a classic perfected

• Scenario 2026: An attacker, having the victim's personal data (full-zill), calls the telecom operator, impersonating them, and orders a SIM card to be reissued with a new chip under their control.
• Result: All SMS and phone calls, including 2FA codes for banks and transaction confirmations, go to the fraudster. This is a complete hijacking of the digital identity based on the phone number.
• Security: Banks in 2026 will introduce additional factors not tied to a phone number (push to an app with geolocation, automated calls with reverse confirmation).

Mobile carding as a process: from infection to cashing out​

1. Infection: The victim installs a malicious app (Android) or is redirected to a phishing site that convinces them to install a profile (iOS).
2. Data theft: The Trojan steals bank session cookies, logins, passwords, and intercepts SMS and push notifications.
3. Bypassing 2FA: Using intercepted codes or spoofing the interface, the attacker logs into the victim's banking application.
4. Monetization within the ecosystem:
   • Fast transfers to fake cards/accounts via P2P services (SBP, Zelle, Venmo).
   • Payment for services and purchase of digital assets: Transfer money to crypto exchange accounts, purchase NFTs, top up gaming accounts.
   • Direct purchases in online retail from linked cards using data stored in the browser/apps.
5. Hiding Tracks: The banking Trojan can hide SMS messages about transactions and disguise balance changes in the app interface to delay detection.

Security 2026: What are banks and users doing?​

From banks and payment systems:

1. Device Binding & Behavioral Biometrics:
   • The app analyzes the user's unique "handwriting" : the angle of the phone, the force of pressing, the scrolling speed, and the typical time of activity.
   • Linking an application to a specific device via hardware identifiers.
2. Trusted Execution Environment (TEE): Critical operations (PIN entry, transaction signing) are performed in a hardware-isolated processor chip, which is inaccessible to the main OS and Trojans.
3. Complex, contextual 2FA scenarios:
   • Push notifications with location map ("You are in Moscow, but the transaction was initiated from Nigeria?").
   • Requiring confirmation in another application (for example, in a bank messenger, and not via SMS).
4. Active application monitoring: Searches for signs of jailbreak, root access, active Accessibility Services, and suspicious overlays.

Recommendations for users (Digital Hygiene 2026):

1. Never install apps outside of official stores (App Store/Google Play), and even there, check ratings and reviews.
2. Never grant Accessibility permissions to apps that are not disability-related.
3. Use hardware security keys (FIDO2) to protect accounts where possible.
4. Enable two-factor authentication wherever available, but prefer non-SMS-based methods (TOTP authenticators like Google Authenticator, Authy).
5. Block the ability to install configuration profiles on iOS and install apps from unknown sources on Android.
6. Use a separate, highly secure device (or at least a separate profile) for financial transactions.

Conclusion: The phone as the Achilles' heel of digital identity​

Mobile carding in 2026 reveals a paradox: the device that should be the key to security (biometrics, tokenization) has become its primary vulnerability due to hyperconnectivity and excessive trust. The threat has shifted from bank servers to the user's pocket.

Victory belongs to whoever controls the user's "digital body" — their smartphone. For fraudsters, this means a shift from software attacks to attacks on a person's attention and habits (social engineering to install a Trojan). For protection, it's necessary to think of a smartphone not as a phone, but as a personal ATM, always with you, always online, and constantly under attack. The battle is for every pixel on the screen and every byte in the device's memory. The war for money has moved into our pockets.