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I use an iPhone. Today I got a text from an unknown number starting from +65. The message was "your one-time Wifi password is xxxx and it’s valid for only 10 minutes". Thought it was a scam and deleted the text.

After an hour or so, my Wifi on my phone got disconnected followed by a pop up saying that password for Wifi is incorrect and asking for the password. I ignored it and immediately turned off Wifi on my phone. Then I used my laptop to login to my modem and changed the Wifi password, and then the phone got connected to Wifi again using the new password.

I’ve been checking my bank accounts and no suspicious activity so far (I’ve enabled Touch ID for banking apps) but I’m just thinking how my phone was disconnected from the Wifi and asking for the new password, when clearly the Wifi password hadn’t been changed (my laptop was able to connect to Wifi with the old password).

Did someone actually hack into my phone and changed the Wifi password and expected me to enter the password sent in the text?

Any advice would be appreciated as I’m concerned about my bank accounts now.

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I'm thinking this is a coincidence.

If it's a phishing/smishing attack, there has to be a link. They're just trying to scare you into clicking that link. Do not click!

If it's a BEC attack, they're trying to get you to reply to the message so that you can then enter a dialog where they try to get you to give them something (the current trend is gift cards or a down payment on something). Do not engage!

In order for it to be what you fear, the attacker would need to be able to correlate between your phone number and your wifi connection. Even if your phone was connecting to the wifi network, the network provider and servers shouldn't have access to your phone number unless you gave it to them or you've got some app on your phone leaking your phone number (which is unlikely).

Country code +65 is Singapore. This might make sense if you're in that country, your wifi provider is based in that country, or you're in some nation that Singaporean phones can more easily/cheaply SMS than other nation(s) they might have phone banks to contact you from.

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The guy was trying to get access to your WiFi. He deauthenticated your device and sent you a phishing page asking you to login again. That's common thing... Keep your Wi-Fi mac filtered or hide your ssid

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    Thanks, I’ve hidden my SSID now, but how he was able to get access to my phone in the first place? How did he know what my number was?
    – Hammad Mansoor
    Mar 4, 2019 at 9:10
  • There is something called social engineering... :) yet many other ways to gather information about you. A perfect phishing attack is based on strong footprint
    – Shehriar Ahmad
    Mar 4, 2019 at 13:00
  • Agreed as my phone number is listed on so many places, but I still don’t get how someone can remotely deauthenticate Wifi on my phone?
    – Hammad Mansoor
    Mar 4, 2019 at 13:26
  • Brother Do a Google Search on deauthenticating devices from a WiFi network. It's not that difficult... Tools like aircrack-ng and others can do it easily. And yeah the recent one Krack...
    – Shehriar Ahmad
    Mar 4, 2019 at 13:41
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    @ShehriarAhmad How would the attacker provide them with a phishing page unless they already control the router?
    – trallgorm
    Mar 6, 2019 at 16:29

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