Friday, April 24, 2015

Fishing is Plenty of Fun... Until You're the one Biting

Online phishing is a major problem in today's highly technological society. The more we post about ourselves on social media, or buy from different websites, the more exposed we are to those which may attempt to steal our information for their own good. This theft may cause financial loss, identity theft, and more. This is online phishing, and if we are not careful, we could all be caught- hook, line, and sinker.

We were in choir. My choir teacher usually let us listen to the songs that we were going to sing, so we could become familiar with the tune. The class began normal, and she booted up her computer to play the song. Unfortunately, her computer never booted up. Before it even got to the desktop, a notice appeared from the "FBI". It informed her that she had violated federal law by downloading materials illegally. She would have to pay an online fine, or else she would be arrested in the upcoming week. This was an attempt at phishing. Someone had claimed to be the FBI in an attempt to gain her credit card information.

Phishing can come in many different forms. Sometimes it uses a virus like in the above, real life example. Often times, phishers use fake emails and messages to attempt to retrieve the information. Just as a fisherman may bait a line that he has cast, these "phishermen" bait the email with claims of the necessity of needed account information. The emails are not obvious, they often come from someone claiming to be from PNC Bank, or from Bank of America. It may say that "Joe" from Bank of America needs your account number to re-authenticate your finances, while in reality, some hacker just wants to re-authenticate your money into his hands.

There are some ways that people can see through the trap of phishing.  One definitely needs to check the grammar and the spelling in the message. Often, the phishers are oversea attackers, meaning that they may not have the best grasp on the English language. This is an obvious give away- as professional banks would never send a mass email with spelling errors. Another way to check for phishing is to check the links contained in the email. Phishing messages always have links- they go to the websites that ask for the information. This means that the websites will be created to resemble professional URLs. There may be an extra letter somewhere in the link, or it may just appear strange. Another way that you can verify that the email is from an authentic source is to call said source. This is a foolproof way to differentiate between the real and the fake messages.

Online phishing is a real danger to our society. Intelligent people are out there trying to steal our information with deceptive emails all the time. We need to take precautions to avoid being taken advantage of, such as a few extra reads of your emails, or a phone call. Often, the emails may not even have a mistake, and be completely foolproof. It just goes to show the kind of danger that online hackers out for free money can cause.

No comments:

Post a Comment