{"id":1064,"date":"2019-10-14T16:37:54","date_gmt":"2019-10-14T20:37:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/blog\/?p=1064"},"modified":"2019-10-14T16:37:54","modified_gmt":"2019-10-14T20:37:54","slug":"how-to-avoid-phishing-scams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/blog\/how-to-avoid-phishing-scams\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Avoid Phishing Scams"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-rank-math-toc-block uk-card-default uk-padding\" style=\"font-size:16px\" id=\"rank-math-toc\"><h4>Table of Contents<\/h4><nav><ul><li><a href=\"#steer-clear-of-the-bait\">Steer clear of the bait<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#safeguard-your-info\">Safeguard your info<\/a><ul><li><a href=\"#about-delete-me\">About DeleteMe<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>With great convenience, and virtually fathomless access to information, entertainment, and ecommerce, comes great risks. That\u2019s the trade-off that all of us make when we use the internet. It\u2019s a significantly greater risk when we use the internet for email and any kind of ecommerce. Doing so opens us up to attempted hacks, identity thieving scams, viruses, malware, spyware, scareware, pharming, and a variety of other criminal schemes. To learn how to avoid phishing scams, you should use the following tips.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"steer-clear-of-the-bait\">Steer clear of the bait<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Among the most common and one of the most dangerous schemes is \u201cphishing.\u201d For the uninitiated, phishing is an email-based scam in which a cyber-criminal (or group of them) send emails purported to be legitimate, from legitimate businesses or friends, that actually contain malicious links or attachments. The point of phishing is to extract private, personal information, and eventually money, from the unsuspecting victim. If there\u2019s anything encouraging about phishing, however, it\u2019s that the people threatened by phishing scams have recourse and can also take steps to avoid being fooled by phishing scams.&nbsp;<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Perhaps the most important rule of avoiding phishing scams is to not click on links you\u2019re sent in an email. (And one of the most effective methods to prevent being reached by phishing emails is learning <a href=\"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\">how to remove personal information from Google<\/a>.) Unfortunately, even your bank, companies you work with, and friends and family can be suspect. After all, logos can be faked, and even if you keep your personal information private, the accounts of friends and family members can still be hacked.&nbsp;<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But there are warning signs. If anything seems \u201coff\u201d or you encounter any of the following, proceed with caution:&nbsp;<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Logos that look \u201coff\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Misspellings and other inconsistencies<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>URLs that don\u2019t match the company\u2019s name<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Unsecured URLs (\u201chttp\u201d rather than \u201chttps\u201d accompanied by the padlock icon)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>URLs with foreign domains&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>URLs with chunks of gibberish early in the address<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The best practice regarding any link you\u2019re sent via email is to ignore the link or attachment and contact the actual company, or the person who supposedly sent you the message. Often, the earlier-mentioned \u201cscareware\u201d scamming will play a part in phishing. You\u2019ll be told some feature of your computer, banking, or something else has been compromised and you need to click a link, open an attachment or provide additional information. In addition to never clicking a link or opening an attachment from an email you\u2019re not quite sure about, you should also <em>never<\/em> fill out forms asking for personal information in an email; particularly if it\u2019s asking for financial data. Any message saying that you\u2019ve won a competition you didn\u2019t enter or should log into a site you aren\u2019t a member of should likewise be deleted.&nbsp;<br><\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/shutterstock_554705755.jpg\" alt=\"avoid phishing scams and phony looking emails\" class=\"wp-image-1067\"\/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"safeguard-your-info\">Safeguard your info<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Along with generally being wary, there are some steps you can take to remain safer and keep your personal information secure. Either learn how to do it yourself or contract with a company that can <a href=\"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\">remove personal information from Google<\/a>. When contracting with a company that can remove your information from Google and data broker sites, choose one that offers disposable email addresses. Having a disposable email address (or more than one) can be useful measure. You can use a disposable email address when you need to provide an email address but don\u2019t want to share your personal one and open yourself up to mountains of spam messages. After all, the less spam you encounter, the better\u2014and the less likely your personal email address will be targeted for a phishing scam.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"about-delete-me\"><strong>About DeleteMe<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>With more than 10 million consumer opt-outs, DeleteMe is a leader in data privacy and security. Based in Boston, they have built that reputation by leveraging their team\u2019s expertise regarding consumer protection, identity theft, and privacy. That expertise is represented by their effective, user-friendly suite of comprehensive privacy solutions. Whether you\u2019re concerned about password protection and <a href=\"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\">removal from Whitepages<\/a>, or payment security and anything else that protects personal and financial security, DeleteMe is the online service you need to keep your personal information private year-round.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Guarantee that your information remains yours alone, at <a href=\"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.joindeleteme.com\/\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">www.joindeleteme.com<\/a><br><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With great convenience, and virtually fathomless access to information, entertainment, and ecommerce, comes great risks. That\u2019s the trade-off that all of us make when we use the internet. It\u2019s a significantly greater risk when we use the internet for email and any kind of ecommerce. Doing so opens us up to attempted hacks, identity thieving [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":5454,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-privacy-tips"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}