Staying Safe Online
You’ve probably heard of “phishing” emails: they’re emails that look like they come from an organization you may know or do business with, such as a retailer, bank, internet service provider, or the like. They try to trick you into clicking on a link that may ask for personal information such as passwords or credit card numbers, which the criminals can then use, or possibly infect your computer with a virus or ransomware that might be difficult or expensive to get rid of. And these bad actors are getting smarter every day—at first glance, many phishing emails look completely legitimate.
It’s important to stay safe online. Here’s a list of some of the common types of suspicious content and how to recognize it so you’re ready to navigate this tricky new reality:
- Check links by hovering over them with your cursor so you can see the name of the link. If the sender appears to be
a legitimate business entity, but when you hover over the email address it shows an unrelated name and/or domain, don’t click!
Instead, go online and manually type in the business’ address, or call them to see if it’s legitimate. - Look carefully for misspellings or substitutions; for example, using the number zero in place of the letter O.
- Don’t click on attachments that contain an “executable” extension type, such as .bat, .js, or .exe. In fact, don’t click
on attachments at all! - Be wary if the email implies you can avoid a negative consequence or gain something of value if you click a link.
- Don’t believe emails promising quick fixes or seemingly unreal promises, like cheap pharmaceuticals, an inheritance,
or romantic connections, for example. If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.
The best single piece of guidance is, “If you can’t confirm it, don’t click it!”
