The skinny on Phishing

Very true, Lindsey,

We should be very careful when we are dealing with any company with our serious personal information. We should only submit our information with them who have a secure database and are represented with a lock symbol in the status bar.

Otherwise, it is always better to do all the necessary correspondence in person. That is the best way to prevent any sort of misuse.

Regards
Roxette

I have learned from watching so many people get scammed that as Roxette stated the best way to do correspondence is in person.

There have been so much scamming go on lately. That you may receive an email and think it is from your bank stating you need to update info or something of that nature. My friend's mom was taking like this. She ended up having over 800 dollars taken from her account. It took her almost a month to get those funds back from the bank.

Another thing that you have to watch out for is when you purchase things using your credit or debit card. Be wary of businesses doing imprints of your card. A friend of mine went to a video store and they did an imprint of her card because their credit card machine was broke and she ended up being taken for over 400 dollars. She was able to get the money back, however it was a big headache because of all the paperwork.

It is amazing what people will do to get a quick buck!!!

I kept getting "emails" from Yahoo the other day trying to get me to download info, fill it out, etc. Almost fell for it, but realized that the tone of the emails was a bit harsh and forceful---not something a REAL company would write.
Hopefully identity theft will be wiped out in the near future somehow!

I am with you on that one Lindsey. Although it seems like it is getting worse by the minute. You cant trust anything anymore. Either you are watching out for a loan scam, or watching out for identity theft.

you are right about that you guys scams are so easy these days we just have to be careful oh what we do on the internet and over the phone cause these days it is so hard to find people who dont lie to you

As if things aren't scary enough, remember to rip up ALL mail when throwing it out. People actually go through trash bags and take YOUR info from your mail!
I tear bank statements and such to pieces before discarding!

Another good thing to do is to put SEE ID on the back of all your credit cards.Some companies dont check since you just swipe your card,but I know the company I work for does and if the card is not signed or if See ID is on back we must check the persons Id.I know if a card doesnt swipe that is a warning sign of a stolen card since that part of the card cant always be duplicated by a forger.Alot of places dont train thier associates to look for these signs and thats a shame,they just assume that the card is worn.

THe sad part is that even if you have SEE ID or CID on the back of your card, it isnt always checked. There have been a couple of times when I would send my husband with my card just to see what stores do and they dont even look at the card when he swipes it. That is the scary thing. Anyone can take your card and use it. Even when you write a check to a store a lot of times they dont match the name on the check to the name on your id. I always say something when this happens. Be careful.

Companies are developing technologies that will quickly stomp most of these phishers and spammers.

In the mean time, there are plenty of things you can do to protect yourself online. Most people seem to think the protection stops with common sense, but sometimes your identiy being stolen can go much deeper to include targetting by hackers or network sniffing at your ISP.

I am a network security analyst who spent a lot of time as a kid doing those things myself ... so I know how to live a protected lifestyle.

I'm going to see if Vikas will let me have a section of the forum dedicated to internet security as this is a growing risk (financially) for many people. You might not see it from your perspective, but from an analyst perspective you'd be suprised to learn just how much you can do to protect yourself by following some pretty simple internet safety guidelines.

Feel free to private message me with these sorts of questions in the meantime.

That would be an excellent idea. You got my vote. A lot of people could benefit from something like this. With identity theft on the rise. I think everyone would agree that a forum dedicated to this topic would benefit us. It is better to have the knowledge and be aware of things like this to help prevent future identity thefts.

Vikas said no. :-(

If anyone needs help they can contact me directly.

Thanks for going the extra mile, crypto!
I'm sure many will benefit from your aids.

Bottom line is that if you don't know the origin of any correspondence then you should not even open it to protect yourself from hidden dangers ranging from spyware to websites designed to hack your computer for information.

example you get a e-mail subject line reads funny one!!! You open it and it is a funny one. and at the end of the joke is a link to see more. you click on the link and it opens a web page that has hidden program language which can do many things from reading your address files to your password information, as well as the web site logging your web adress information. this is important more and more people have broadband and don't always shut there computer down everyday to renew thier IP address on a regular basis.
I hope this makes sense to everyone, that it is important to only open e-mail from people you trust and be wary of attachments even if the e-mail is frome someone that you do know.

Mails keep coming regularly in my inbox. I have noticed that senders use a part of my email address to get it delivered to me. I mean, they have a common address and offer is sent to any name similar to that address. Most of them happen to be scams and those are really dangerous. We need protection from such spam mails.