Address
Whiteland, IN 46184
Work Hours
Monday to Friday: 9AM - 5PM
Weekend: 1PM - 3PM
The internet seems to be the best thing to happen since sliced bread at least in this generation. The worldwide interconnection of computers is the backbone of world economies, it created a countless number of jobs both directly and indirectly and today we have billions of people on the internet.
Unfortunately, the ubiquitous nature of the internet also means that it has become a hotspot for cybercriminals and their illegal activities Cybersecurity Ventures official Annual Cybercrime Report in 2016 projected that cybercrime damages about 6 trillion dollars by 2021 which “represents the greatest transfer of wealth in economic history”. One of the more popular techniques amongst others that these criminals might utilize to gain unauthorized access to users’ private data and accounts is known as phishing.
Phishing is a technique that has been in existence for as long as I remember. I remember reading about it for the first time when I was checking out the features of an antivirus app on Symbian back in the days.
Phishing is an attempt to obtain user private data like username, passwords, emails, credit/debit card information etc via fraudulent means. This is done by posing as the legitimate entity maybe by creating and using a fake version of the original website with a similar-looking domain name or by sending targeted emails to companies using an email address that resembles that of another legitimate company that might be a business partner and drafted like the original. A lot of people have unknowingly given away their confidential login credentials and then they get (unpleasantly) surprised when their accounts get hacked because as far as they can tell, they never gave away their credentials and all their transactions were performed with the real company.
So, phishing is simply a way of tricking people into giving away their private details.
The first step to avoiding phishing is to recognise when you are about to get phished. Let’s take a look at some telltale signs of phishing.
A domain name is a unique identifier used in accessing a website and it has to be purchased from a domain registrar like GoDaddy, Bluehost, NameCheap etc. Fortunately, once purchased, domain names cannot be purchased by another entity unless the present entity fails to renew it after its expiration (a minimum of 12 months). Although, quite unfortunately, there’s nothing stopping another entity from getting a domain name that closely resembles an already purchased one which is good for availability but bad for security and what most big brands do is to try and purchase domain names similar to what they have already. This is quite impossible to achieve completely as all a fraudster needs is to get a domain that is similar enough to fool an untrained eye into thinking it’s legit.
The safest thing to do while transacting with a website is to be sure of the domain name which is visible on the address bar which is located at the top of the browser. Too many words and hyphens is usually a red flag as it indicates an attempt to create something different but similar to the original.
It is always advisable to call first to confirm and to ask a few questions before going ahead to give away any confidential information especially if you are not sure whether that email came from a legit source or whether the website you are currently visiting is a legitimate one but then again even legit email accounts or social media accounts can be hacked and used for illegal activities. While this has saved me personally from being scammed, the reliability of this depends on whether the phone number you have is actually legit. So, it is safe to use a phone number previously collected and not one present in the email or gotten from the suspicious website.
Whenever you receive an offer on social media (WhatsApp especially), maybe a promo or an anniversary one in a lifetime kind of deal, it is usually too good to be true if it seems too good to be true. Such offers are usually designed by scammers to be too compelling for customers to resist and you usually realise it’s a scam when they don’t fulfil their lofty promises but by then it is too late as you have already given away your private credentials.
Cybercrime is a very serious concern to businesses and entrepreneurs in the age of the internet as it ruins businesses and reputation causing the world to lose trillions of dollars and there is no shortage of techniques used to defraud people online. Phishing is just one of the most popular and straightforward ways cybercriminals achieve their aim on the internet and till this day due to the relative lack of awareness about this technique, I still see a lot of phishing websites and web links floating around on social media.