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Scams Phishing


CliveH

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Just received another Phishing Scam

 

 

"Dear Customer,

 

Security machinery at National Westminster Bank has been upgraded to provide customers

with a faster, easier and more efficient online experience.

 

All customers are required to update their account information.

 

Click here to Login to complete the update process.

 

Note: Failure to update your information will lead to online service suspension.

 

Yours sincerely,

Online Customer Service

National Westminster Bank plc"

 

 

...........................................................

 

It has a copy Nat West logo etc - it might fool some people

 

But as a warning - Do not open it.

 

Delete it then go to deleted items and remove it totally.

 

 

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RogerC - 2013-08-05 1:38 PM

 

Anything like that ..paypal, bank etc I always forward it to the 'real' company/organisation for investigation.  It might or might not help them but hopefully it does help stop these scammers.

 

 

Sorry, although I understand your reasoning I always delete them immediately. It is possible the real Company will investigate but I suspect they get so many that they cannot check them all, plus as soon as they close one, another appears. Get rid of them as quickly as possible as you may open the thing by mistake and download something nasty apart from the written scam.

 

Outlook will identify spam and delete it for you. Of course it may make a mistake and delete something important but that is a risk although very small.

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We had a dodgy looking email come through about a month back, claiming to be from Paypal..

 

I forwarded it to them and within a day or so I had a(and I paraphrase):

 

"Dear Mr XX.X..

Thank you for forwarding that email....your suspicions were correct,

it was indeed dodgy. We will look into asap.

Kind Regards

Miss YYY"

... type of response. ;-)

 

Which I was quite surprised at to be honest, as I had assumed that they'd get too many to respond to on an individual basis.. :-S

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Dave225 - 2013-08-05 5:35 PM

 

RogerC - 2013-08-05 1:38 PM

 

Anything like that ..paypal, bank etc I always forward it to the 'real' company/organisation for investigation.  It might or might not help them but hopefully it does help stop these scammers.

 

 

Sorry, although I understand your reasoning I always delete them immediately. It is possible the real Company will investigate but I suspect they get so many that they cannot check them all, plus as soon as they close one, another appears. Get rid of them as quickly as possible as you may open the thing by mistake and download something nasty apart from the written scam.

 

Outlook will identify spam and delete it for you. Of course it may make a mistake and delete something important but that is a risk although very small.

 

Interesting - so am I wrong then to do as I do?

 

Last year I had a similar email allegedly from my bank so I phoned their internet security department and they asked me to forward the complete email to them. I later had an email from the bank saying that that particular 'operation' had ended with the offenders being caught and prosecuted.

 

I'm not daft, or egotistical, to enough to think that their success was solely down to me of course but every little helps as the saying goes!

 

I was always under the impression that the body of an email could do you no harm when opened - is this incorrect - but I do know that attachments and links that you open are another thing and can really harm the computer and your bank balance.

 

On that basis I tend to open emails but not attachments, and never click on a link, unless I am absolutely sure that I know where they come from and in what context. Even emails that seem to come from a known and trusted contact can be hijacked to include malicious attachments so I always read the title before opening and if it makes no sense or was not expected I don't open it but I do email the contact and ask for clarification. Any emails from unknown senders are deleted unopened.

 

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Tracker...as I understand it you are correct.  Opening the e mail does not mean you will be hit with a virus but opening an attachment probably does.  Paypal has an active anti phishing programme and asks those receiving such e mails to forward them as I suspect other on line service providers would have....banks for example.

 

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Before I get thrown in the corner, yet again may I state that if you wish to pass these things on, then that is your choice. Personally i do not believe that the Companies are not fully aware of what is being passed off in their names, after all even their own employees must get these damn things. The 'real' Companies will always tell you they never contact you by e mail and will never ever ask for personal information. If they ever do call you then call them back on a different telephone, oh nand by the way it may not be a good idea to give your mobile number to all and sundry.

 

As for getting a virus by e mail I agree it is not really there yet, but then again who actually knows. After all if you push 'stop' on a telephone message that activates the damn thing.

 

Personally i just get rid of them as quickly as possible, I do not even open them as they all go to junk anyway, but then again that is my choice. However I am always amazed at the number of trojans etc I seem to pick up from seemingly innocent things which the security device does not see, until you actually go check, so i am sure someone out there somewhere is working on the trojan e mail. I note even the Russians are going back to typewriters for security. Tells you something does it not???

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Guest Had Enough

I'm afraid that anyone thinking that you must open an attachment to get an infection from an e-mail is behind the times.

 

It is possible to get an infection simply by opening the e-mail, you do not have to open an attachment.

 

Dave225's advice is the most sensible. Delete them immediately without opening them.

 

http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/thinking-tech/virus-alert-you-can-now-get-infected-by-opening-an-e-mail/10170

 

http://www.technewsdaily.com/7505-drive-emails.html

 

Even better, use GMail to send and collect your mail from your existing accounts. Since I did this I have removed all other email scanning programmes. GMail has the the very best spam algorithms and does as good a job at detecting rogue messages as any other paid-for programme I've ever used.

 

I never get a spam message in my inbox, they all end up in the spam folder and any message with a suspect virus or trojan never reaches my computer. GMail sends me a message to tell me that an email may contain a virus and suggests that I don't download it from their server. Just delete that message and after a certain time frame GMail deletes it from its server.

 

GMail along with Microsoft Security Essentials, a totally free anti-virus application has kept my PC free of any infection for a long time.

 

http://freebies.about.com/od/computerfreebies/gr/microsoft-security-essentials-review.htm

 

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