PHISHING 101:
Don't Get Tricked Into Identity Theft

Phishing (pronounced just like 'fishing') is a popular activity among real life Internet villains. Whether you have heard the term phishing or not, chances are good that you've received a phishing email.

Phishing is a way that Internet scammers trick you into providing your personal and financial details. Phishing opens the door to identity theft, and more, including potentially allowing a virus to infect your computer.

Phishers create email that looks VERY much like an official email from some important entity, like eBay, MSN, Paypal, or perhaps a bank. We've even seen phishing emails that appear to be sent by "Brainstorm Support."The email asks you to visit some site, which again, looks very official and proper. There you're then prompted to enter your personal information in the guise of "verification".The problem is that if you follow their instructions, you've just handed over all your personal information to a thief.

Sometimes phishers will try to get you to go to a web page which is intentionally infected with a virus. If you use Windows, make sure you have a good antivirus program. If you have an antivirus program make sure it's updated. If you DON'T have an antivirus program, or you have one that has EXPIRED, we recommend the free Microsoft Security Essentials at http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials. (If you have an antivirus program, and it's expired, be sure to uninstall it before installing a new one).

The single biggest way to avoid a phishing trap is simply to know that a legitimate business will not ask you to verify your sensitive information through an email. If you're not sure, pay attention to the link they ask you to click on. When you hover your mouse over a link in an email, you will see the destination of the link in a small popup or in the status bar at the bottom of your window. Look at the destination address closely and you'll see that it probably goes somewhere different than the address in the email. Sometimes the address is obviously different, and sometimes it is very subtle. For example, hover your mouse over the following link (don't click it, just move the mouse over the link to see the address come up) to see an example of a phishing link.

www.paypal.com

A good rule of thumb: Don't click on email links asking you to log into your account to verify information.

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