I recently almost managed to fall hook, line and sinker for what was no doubt one of the latest email fishing scams.
If a Ugandan “prince,” “wealthy beneficiary” or some “lawyer” from Asia is asking you to help transfer millions or even billions of dollars, compensating your time with a small fortune, that's an obvious con.
Less obvious are phishing scams from supposed financial institutions claiming your account has been compromised and that you must click on a link embedded in the bogus email to verify your personal information — major red flag here, folks, delete that message immediately. At the very least, call your bank or financial institution — they'll tell you they won't ask for such sensitive information by email and be able to confirm your account's status.
I generally recognize these scams from miles away and delete them before I've even bothered to finish reading the subject line.
But when recently browsing emails on my smartphone, I saw what looked like a rather legitimate $20-plus receipt for several songs purchased from the iTunes store that I never bought. I initially fell for it and started to worry that either my credit card or my Apple account had been compromised and that either way, I would have a lengthy list of costly, fraudulent charges to report by the time I got home after work if I didn't take action.
Fortunately, I cannot stand doing such troubleshooting from my phone — it's far too tedious and cumbersome to fumble clumsily with my fingers on a small screen when I can go so much faster with a mouse and keyboard at a computer. In the digital era, I'm already a dinosaur in that regard. But I digress.
Tempted as I was, I did not click on the email's embedded link to check my fake order, as the scammer was prompting me to do. I instead reset my password for my Apple account by manually logging in through a computer, completely separate from the email I was sent.
That's about when I remembered an almost identical attempt had been made against my eldest sister, who recently visited from the east. She too had almost fallen for it.
My next step, which I now realize probably should have been my first step, was simply to check the balance on my credit card — a lunch purchase from less than an hour before had already appeared on my statement online, but there was no indication of the alleged charge from iTunes.
Whoever says crime does not pay is utterly wrong. If that statement were true, there would be no criminals, which means there would be no con artists and phishing emails or scams. Yet in the digital age, identity theft is becoming ever more prevalent, costing economies billions every year. That means there most certainly is money to be made.
So if you ever have any doubts when looking at a convincingly legitimate-looking email, verify the sender's address. Through my smartphone's Hotmail service, the message allegedly came from “Apple.” But once I clicked on the name of the sender, a bizarre, lengthy, certainly-not-from-Apple email address came up. That's your first and probably biggest indication of whether the message is fraudulent.
Still have doubts? Call either your credit card company to verify your account's activity or perhaps even email or otherwise contact whichever firm is allegedly asking you to verify your information.
As email phishing scams become increasingly convincing and legitimate-looking, so too must the Internet's denizens become ever more cautious and vigilant to protect themselves from identity theft.
