EXPOSED: How to Identify Phishing Scams

Like death and taxes, online scams are inevitable. Among the most widely known flimflams is phishing, in which perpetrators try to steal your private information, such as online-account logins and personal financial data, via fake e-mails, websites, and even phone texts.

A typical phishing solicitation appears to be from a company or service you trust and possibly already do business with, including a bank, a payment service such as PayPal, internet banking or an agency such as the NIMC or a telco.

But a number of telltale signs can help you identify phishing cons. Read on for tips on staying safe and protecting your information.

How to Identify Phish

Here are some ways you can vet an e-mail that makes you suspicious.

• Look for grammar and spelling oddities and errors
• Check the addresses—are they legitimate, or a little off?
• Hover over links within the e-mail to see the real URLs.
• Don’t click on any link in the e-mail; type the given URLs into your browser.
• If you’re unsure of a site, try signing in with the wrong password first. 
• Below are some real-life examples of phish e-mails as well as the warning signs we spotted in each

Common Examples of Phishing Exploits are given below:

Scammers will send you tons of emails like one shown above, but you should be able to tell the this is a scam by looking at the spellings, hovering your mouse on the sender’s name will reveal the actual address of the sender, and a bogus link asking you to fill in some information.

Fake-antivirus attacks are the biggest security trap when you’re using a browser. Here’s what can happen.

The attacker pops up a box like the one above, telling you your PC is infected. You’re convinced to click a “scan” button to “clean up” your PC. This actually installs an exploit that causes problems, such as hiding files, desktop items, documents, and pictures. The attacker then asks for a fee to fix the damage it “finds.”

Fake AV can be cleaned up without paying a fee to the hacker, but it can be a tricky, multi-step process. To avoid the fake-AV trap, learn the messages your own security software gives. And always assume a pop-up warning is bogus, until you check it thoroughly.

Get Knowledge, Be Protected!