Phishing is a cyber-attack in which hackers administer a fraudulent activity employing email, telephone, text message, or phone calls. Phishers may try to steal your credit card information or trick you into doing something by shocking you. Such scams often ask you to “confirm” your identity by going to a fake website and providing your personal data. In this section, we’ve explored email phishing specifically. Scammers tend to use this method to attack students.
The ultimate goal of every phishing activity is for the receiver to open up the email and provide the requested info by clicking on the link. That’s why the requests are usually one of these:
- Fraud Google Doc notifications.
- Emails asking for your login information.
- “Tech Support” scams with concerns about your laptop’s issues.
- Emails about scholarships and tuition payment processors.
- “Work-from-home” scams.
- Impersonated IRS requests asking you to pay “federal student tax” via the link.
- Fraud ads regarding housing.
- Emails that have “important information about your school account.”
Keep in mind:
No official organization asks a student or any other person to send their personal data via email without any warning. In particular, no banks, social media representatives, or other trustworthy sources seek your passwords.
How to Prevent Email Phishing
To avoid phishing risks, you need to pay close attention to what type of emails you receive and open. You can identify if you got spam email by the following features:
However, knowing what to look out for in the email is not always enough to protect yourself. From time to time, it will be dangerous to open spam messages. To avoid these situations, you need to do the following:
- Don’t share your personal information via email and via messages.
- If you need to send a confidential letter, make sure the email of the receiver is legitimate.
- Use filters in your mailbox and all the messengers.
- Don’t post any personal information on untrustworthy websites.
- Use multi-factor authentication whenever it is possible.
- Check the list of cyber threats that attack the students from your campus.
Source: https://ivypanda.com/blog/cyber-security-threats/