Sharp rise in fake TSB text messages and phishing emails

How To Spot Fake Email Addresses?

Every day we get multiple emails, some for Amazon order confirmation, some health checkups, restaurants/takeaway notifications, and some fake. We delete many without looking into the details, but some are convincing and appear reliable.

If you receive any such messages from a reliable company but with different addresses, do not respond, instead report it or forward it to regulatory agencies.  The opportunist fraudsters use smishing (SMS + phishing) techniques to extract the recipient's Pin, passwords, and sensitive details.

People are tricked into looking into individual emails. They are redirected to websites selling fake services and products as they click the links since many are fooled into believing the messages. 

Action Fraud reported over 80 per cent of the attempts is related to website links. While your system can be safe and secure, they use sophisticated mechanisms to approach customers.  Hence, you should always be alert and do not assume all communications to be authentic.

They use software to change the sender ID, and the messages look like they are coming from an authorised source as spoofing is commonly used to change the address and numbers.

There Are Ways One Can Spot Fakes - 

• Check if the full address of the sender is not mentioned as a default. Instead, it shows the name of the sender as Amazon Order or Amazon. 

• You can click the email address to see if the name can be seen or not, and if the mail arrives from an unusual domain other than the regular amazon.co.uk or .com, it shows a con.

• Such mails have multiple irregularities that one can track, like grammar errors, unlike genuine automated mails. For example, the contact details and instructions may not be understandable or written in small fonts or are completely wrong.  It shows the confirmation email is not real.

• If the sender creates panic, it indicates they want to extract information or get your account details. They expect you to call the company and tell them about the irregularity and disclose your details. They have your email address and name, and they may seek to get more information about their targets.

What Should You Not Do If You Get The Messages?

• Never click on the links sent in such emails as they aim to get personal details through the fake fill in forms, or they may install malware into your device.

• Do not ring the contact number out of curiosity, as it can be one of the prime tricks where you can lose a lot of money by confirming your number.

• Be vigilant if you cannot confirm the identity of the messages that they have used to contact you. They may claim to be from a trusted source and ask for pins, passwords, or random information.

• Do not initiate any fund transfer to an unknown account, specifically if you have been asked to pay unusually, like crypto-assets or vouchers.

• Microsoft recently released a warning to the office user to be attentive to the several techniques the scammers use to evade filters to enter your inbox like spoofed display sender address, sender email address, target usernames, domains and display names.

• However, if you click on such logins or give any details to the unknown sender, change your login credentials immediately.