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I have to be honest. When I saw my first phising email, I thought
it was legit. I emailed the bank and said I don't even have an account
with you. The damn scammer had the balls to email me back and say
"What was your account number and password again?". That's when
it hit me, I'm being scammed. It seems like the Summer of 2003 opened
everybody's eyes. In one year the reported number of victims of
scammers via email went up 800%. Let's see if we can help you stay
clear of these jerks.
Honestly, the number one be-all, end-all answer is to never give
your financial information out ever. If my bank emails, calls, or
instant messages me; I delete the message or hang up the phone.
I then immediately look back at all the information that I got when
I set up an account and call that support number just to check if
it was a scam. I did this three times this year alone.
Other things that are a dead give away that it is a fake include:
1. Bad Spelling-
Most scammers are not native born English speakers. When you see
them spell "bank" as "banks", you know something is screwy.
2. Funky URLs-
I would never click on a bank's email to me. Even when I know it's
legit and I initiated the email. But, if you must look for non-alphabetic
charcaters or symbols.
3. High Sense of Urgency-
These scams last about 48 hours until someone finds out and takes
action to shut down their sites. So the email always says, "Act
NOW or some huge problem will occur!"
4. "Confirm" or "Validate" Are In The Title
Of The Email-
I have yet to see a bank in the last two years use these two words
in their emails. They know that their customers don't trust that,
so they don't do it that way.
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