How to avoid phishing scams
Phishing emails are often disguised as legitimate emails from legitimate companies that users often transact with, whose primary motive is to gain access to your personal information. They are often sent by “phishers” who are also hackers, scammers, identity thieves or spammers.
How to identify a phishing email
Phishing emails often come disguised as legitimate correspondence from a financial institution such as a bank or credit card company. They will tell you that they are currently in the process of merging and to protect your account you must confirm your account details with them, including your bank account number, full name and password where possible.
Other phishing emails will tell you that you’ve won a foreign lottery (your email has been pulled or your name) and in order for them to process your check you need to provide them with your bank details. Some phishing emails contain a link that, when clicked, will redirect you to a legitimate-looking site where you enter your personal information. Others often have some kind of form included in the body of the message that you need to fill out.
Avoiding phishing emails
If you receive an email, pop-up message or instant message that asks for your personal details or other personal information, do not respond to them. If they send you a link to click, don’t click it. It will only redirect you to a fake site. If you want to go to the bank’s legitimate site where you can make transactions, enter their address in the URL field of your browser.
Do not call a number that will be listed in an email, pop-up or instant message that you will receive from unsolicited sources. These numbers often do not have an 800 prefix. Again, these numbers may simply be numbers used by criminals, identity theft. If you want to call your bank, call them on the number listed on your financial statement.
If you receive suspicious emails, mark them as spam to avoid receiving them in the future. Send the email and report it to your email provider so that they are aware that phishing emails of this type are being sent to their subscribers and can take appropriate action. Print the email as well and send it to the relevant institution or organization. They should also be aware of this phishing email so they can warn their depositors or customers about this problem.
If you have subscribed to any mailing list, unsubscribe. Mailing lists of this kind can also be hacked by malicious individuals or identity theft criminals to gain access to multiple email accounts at once. There are also sites that will sell your email to organizations that may have other motives for emailing you.
Read the privacy policy of every site you visit that asks for your personal information. This document clearly explains what information they will collect and how that information will be treated, stored and destroyed (if necessary). This should tell you whether the site you are transacting with cares enough about your personal information or not.
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