Phishing E-mails

[Toby]

Hi guys,

We occasionally get a thread or two where a member has received a 'phishing email' (an email which appears to be from a reputable company but is actually a fraudster)

I have decided to link to a great article talking about this from 'The Blue' and it talks through what phishing e-mails are, how they are designed/sent and how you can prevent them.

Fraudsters - making Social Media an antisocial place

What are your thoughts on these e-mails? Have you been a victim? What tips do you have to prevent this?

Cheers, Toby

Update:

Hi guys, the page has been updated with more information of how to prevent phishing email scams, so take a look and familiarize yourself with it, as well as using it to help others, should you see any reports on the community.

http://news.o2.co.uk/2013/01/09/fraudsters-making-social-media-an-antisocial-place/

Thanks, Toby

[adamtemp64]

Phishing emails should be reported to action fraud http://www.actionfraud.police.uk/scam-emails

That is what I do with those that my spam filter catches on my isp email

Nothing you can do to prevent them emailing you but depending on spam filtering your isp offers you can consign them to a spam folder and auto delete after a period of time.

[jkgwatcher]

There is a phishing mail on the loose. as follows:

 

Dear Customer,

You have a pending security update on your account.

Visit www.o2.co.uk/account/security/online.html to avoid any future network disruption.

(The link of course points somewhere not O2, i.e. http://phpkong.tk/account/O2Network_Security.html so I have disabled it.

Regards

The O2 Team

I expect it invites the victim to enter theie O2 account username and password

[Toby]

Thanks for that Adam.

jkgwatcher: I'm glad you noticed the issue and did not proceed and thanks for alerting everyone about it. I hope the page I have linked to is helpful.

Toby

[perksie]

I use this program which will warn you if you try and use a fake link when connecting to a site where you need to log in, it seems very effective and most UK banks offer it now:

http://www.trusteer.com/download-trusteer-rapport

[Toby]

Update:

Hi guys, the page has been updated with more information of how to prevent phishing email scams, so take a look and familiarize yourself with it, as well as using it to help others, should you see any reports on the community.

http://news.o2.co.uk/2013/01/09/fraudsters-making-social-media-an-antisocial-place/

Thanks, Toby

[gemz4the1]

I've lost count of the number of phishing scams I've seen.

There are different methods to find out if it is a phishing scam:

- Obviously you need to be suspicious about any email that you receive which is from someone you do not know.

- The bank ones are very common - for example if it's an email from Barclays Bank about your account and you don't have a Barclays Bank account then it's obviously a phishing scam.  Even if you are a Barclays Bank customer, a bank will never ask for your personal details so DO NOT enter any personal details/bank information.  If in doubt, give your bank a ring to ask them if the email is from them (call the number on the banks website and not the one in the email).

- If you click on the email address which you received the email from, for example it may say it is from Amazon but the email is from an address which isn't ending in @amazon.co.uk then it's likely to be a phishing scam.

- Is the email personal? Who is it addressed to? Emails which are addressed to you as 'customer' 'user' or your email address are common types of phishing scams.

- Emails with links on for you to provide your details - most of these links are to external sites - DO NOT enter your details.

- It may ask you to download something - such as a programme to protect your computer - DO NOT download anything.

- Some email providers, such as MSN/Hotmail, provide an option in your email account for you to report an email as a phishing scam - if you have that option in your email account please use it.  Also, block the email address or domain name so that you will no longer receive emails from them.

- Many companies/banks have set up phishing scam emails addresses for you to forward the email to them for them to check and to make other users aware of it.