Guarding Against Email Scams
By Susan Dunn, MA, Marketing Coach & Consultant
The email scams aren't going to go away. Our only recourse
is to stay ahead of the game by learning its rules. The way
to do this is using the Emotional Intelligence competency of
intuition. Intuition is not some "mystical" thing; it's the
result of experience and processing, and then getting
mindful about what you've learned that you aren't initially
aware of. There is always something "odd" about these
emails. Stay alert and follow your instincts. Intuition is
knowing, rather than thinking. One type of email scam is designed to get secure information
from you - and who knows what else. I haven't replied to
any, so I don't know what else is involved. I don't want to
know, and you don't either. The least innocuous result
would be getting your email address on some mailing list.
The worst-case scenario? Viruses, hardware crashes,
identity fraud, access to your account and money, and who
knows what else. If you have an Internet business, or spend a lot of time on
the Internet, as I do, and receive hundreds of s*** emails
per day, you learn to recognize the signs. (Intuition is
really a matter of lots of experience and paying attention
to the "signals" which alert you that something is amiss.) If you do business on the Internet, as I do, likely you have
a PayPal account. This latest scam sends you an email
warning you that your PayPal account is about to expire, and
requests information, or requests that you go to a site to
update your information. (I have recently been receiving
these allegedly from ebay as well.) As you know, PayPal
says they will never ask you for this information via email,
and they warn you not to give it. How do you recognize the scam email? I'm both sorry and
delighted, as an English major, and champion of proper
English, to say that one of the signs of a scam email is
poor English. SUBJECT LINE First of all, the subject line is almost always peculiar.
The latest one I received reads "YOUR PAYPAL.COM ACCOUNT
EXPIRES." No one would write this way. More likely it
would say "Important information about your PayPal account,"
or "Notice about account" or something like that. Who
writes subject lines in all caps? It's also in the wrong
tense. Your account WILL expire, or IS GOING to expire,
yes? BAD ENGLISH Within fake messages I have always - ALWAYS - found typos
and grammatical errors, and I mean blatant ones. This
particular email contained: "To avoid any interruption in
PayPal services then you will need to run the application
that we have sent with this email (see attachment) and
follow the instructions." "Then" doesn't belong in this
sentence. Skim through the email and you will find bad English. I
mean far worse than usual! SIGNATURE LINE The signature line doesn't ring true either. Use your
intuition. I have received some that said "Benjamin Smith,
Director of Services, blah blah." Nowhere on the PayPal
site will you find anyone's name of position within the
company . will you? One of the feelings we all have about
the Internet is that anonymity, and it holds true. Who
"runs" amazon.com? I mean what person? Another sure clue is those odd words or letters at the
bottom. I've tried to find out what purpose they serve (to
the perpetrator, I mean) and haven't been able to, but if
they're there, there's your clue. In this case the email is signed: "Thank you for using PayPal. > At other times there are several lines of letters or words
running across the bottom. FAKE WEBSITE Other emails will tell you to go to a URL to give
information about your account. It will not be
www.paypal.com or https://paypal.com but something else.
Often it is a site with PayPal listed at the end, like
www.xxxxxxxxxx.com/paypal.htm . DON'T GET CURIOUS Pay attention to when you feel something's suspicious, but
beyond that don't get curious. What are these people after?
I don't know, and I caution you not to be investigate. Just
delete the email or forward it on to PayPal (see
instructions below). Don't go to the spoof site they list,
or open the attachment, or reply to the email. If you are in doubt, call the business the email is
allegedly from. In this case, if you go to the PayPal site,
you will see ample information about fraud and protection of
your account. Included is the advice that you go to paypal
and log in: https://www.paypal.com . Also that you report
any possible spoof email or fake websites by forwarding the
email to spoof@p... . You can go here
https://www.paypal.com/ewf/f=sa_fake to report a fake as
well. PayPal tells you how they will request information
from you, for instance, using your first and last name, and
that they will also request you go to https://www.paypal.com
and login. If you use a service such as PayPal, be sure and
check out their anti-fraud information. Lastly, here are two numbers where you can reach PayPal:
1-888-221-1161 and 1-402-935-2050 should you wish to talk to
someone. In sum, look for these clues re: fake email and when in
doubt, call the company, or simply delete the email without
responding to it: · Strange subject lines
> zapzevoe"
· Your first and last name are not used
· Grammatical errors, typos and misspellings within the body
of the email
· Letters strung out at the bottom of the email
©Susan Dunn, MA, Marketing Coach and Consultant,
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