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12/14/2006

I hate phish

Like most people, I loath phishing scams. Most of the time I don’t pay attention to them, but after having to assist a family member with a legal/financial mess that occurred as result of one these scams, I’m more aware of these things then ever.

Today, this one landed in my email and since the hubby works for BofA, I took notice …
Dear Bank of America Customer,

Due to the recent phishing attacks targeting Bank of America we are currently launching a new security system. In order to benefit from the new facilities please follow the link below. To update your account status please AUTHENTICATE and complete the necessary steps.

Failure to authenticate your account may result in account malfunction, slow online experience or even exposure of sensible data. Please do not reply to this message. For any inquiries, contact Customer Service.

Bank of America Copyright © 2006

What gets me most about this one, is that it uses the fear of “phishing attacks” as the hook to try and get you to bite. Knowing the relative that fell for this type of scam before, she’d probably be susceptible to this type of email tactic too.

Anyway … along these lines I’m curious, have any libraries out there developed or presented workshops for library patrons on phishing scams and internet safety? If so, I wonder if you'd share materials ... for this one public service topic that libraries could surely assist with.


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree that libraries could surely assist in this topic, though first we must make sure our staff are aware of such problems and are themselves not a victim.

Another such issue are those hoax emails that everyone rushes to click the forward button on. I constantly try and remind my staff that if they are going to forward or email for that matter something to more than 3-4 recipients to use the BCC: field. Also to check out sites like Snopes.com to see if they are hoaxes.

Undoubtedly on occasion someone forwards me something that though I know is a hoax is a good message hidden within so I'll pass it on to those closest to my heart, otherwise I do the research and Reply ALL in the BCC field and provide the link to the hoax reference.

I will be interested to see what others reply to your post.

Matt said...

Bloomington Public Library in Illinois used to run a computer club for folks 55+ years of age, and we covered various internet scams (phishing being the major one) and identity theft several times throughout the two year tenure of this program.