Phishing Scams

Phishing is yet another way that online hackers and criminals have found to trick you into giving them your important information, such as credit card numbers, passwords to bank sites and other financial sites, account data and more.

This crime was identified and named in the late 90’s, and relates to the word ‘fishing’ which is a form of ‘bait’ to get you to believe that they are legitimate.

Electronic Theft

What they do is send information via electronically, usually email, which masquerades as a legitimate site such as your bank, Credit Card Company or auction site, such as EBay, even an online payment site such as PayPal. They look completely authentic, with logo and some personal information, but they are not.

Once you open the email that you might think is truly from a company you use regularly, because it looks so authentic, and they ask for you to verify information, or complete a sale, or even change your password, but what that link leads you to is a fraudulent website that even looks like a website you generally use and trust, and when you verify your information, they now have access and your security information is no longer safe.

Con artists like this use this information to steal from you, sometimes in a big way such as identity theft, but mostly it is to gain access to your bank accounts in order to steal money from your account, to open a new account in your name, and to use your credit cards, etc.

Millions Of Emails

These criminals send out thousands and sometimes millions of these emails regularly and sometimes get a hit, and sometimes they don’t. The important thing to remember is to NEVER open a link attached to an email from an institution or bank that you use, period. Best advice is to call the company to find out if that link or email was legitimate.

Recent Attacks

As of recently, the phishers are targeting mostly bank and online bank customers, and also with emails that look like they came from the Internal Revenue Service, or the Australian Tax Office, which contain information about you, without the personal identification information. This in turn leads you to believe that the email is legitimate, and when you click and give information, your personal information is theirs.

Social Networking Scams

Also a more recent target of these criminals are Social Networking sites, since a lot of them contain personal data, they allow the phishers access to that information in an effort to get your critical personal data. Some, such as MySpace, recently had a worm which took over some individual profile pages and altered the link to put the users onto another website to get their log-in details. It seems that the Social Networking phishers are about 70 percent successful with this latest scam.

Hacking Personal Data

Some of these scam artists also hack into sites that contain sensitive information, such as the recent TD Ameritrade’s database attack, and they were able to steal as much as they wanted, as TD Ameritrade has a database with over 6.3 million customers, which included social security numbers, account numbers, names, addresses, dates of birth, phone numbers and much more.

Precautions

But, there is help out there. First, always doubt emails coming from a company you deal with regularly. Check with them first before you open any links or emails, even the emails sometimes come with a virus attached which can gain access to your personal data on your own computer.

Internet Protection

Most new browsers come with anti-phishing software, as well as email servers. They look at the emails coming in and can warn if they seem illegitimate. Browsers will also now alert users to possible fraudulent websites, and ask if you want to proceed. Make sure all of your email and browser software are the most recent available, as the newest versions are already aware of the newest scams, most times.

What To Do?

When you’ve received a scam email or have found a suspicious link in an email or website, report from your browser – most offer an option to report an ‘UNSAFE WEBSITE’ which you will need to click and report.

Also, there are sites that allow you to report phishing information that has come to your attention or your inbox. One company that has a reporting website is US-CERT. They will allow you to report or email the phishing email or website to them in an effort to bring a stop to this criminal activity.

Another site, in AU is SCAM watch, which also allows you to report a phishing scam, and also view examples of phishing emails, websites, etc. They will ask for the email, usually, to be sent to them so that they can trace the source.

Best advice anyone can get is to set up your email and browser to only trusted sites. If an email comes in that is not from a familiar I.P. address it will automatically go to spam, and the browser will warn you of the fraud.

Please, do not ignore these signs or warnings, they can cost you your identity at worst, and a whole lot of other hassles, such as having to change your account numbers, your email access, and everything else you can imagine.

Play it safe and do not trust the Internet fully. There are people out there who are skilled enough to trick millions of people each year; they might find a way to reach you as well if you’re not careful!

Related posts:

1. Financial Scams – How to Spot and Avoid Them