Scam emails. They have been a nuisance ever since the email was invented. Most scam emails are only an annoyance clogging up your inbox, but some can pose a significant threat to your personal and business data.
Read more: Phishing - What it is and what you need to know about it?
In this article, we will be outlining a few of the most common types of scam emails, what you can do to detect them and make sure your inbox is free of unwanted emails in the future.
Nowadays, we easily give out our email to any sites without much thoughts, which leaves our accounts open for receiving emails from people we do not even know.
These emails can be very harmful to your computer and/or sensitive data once opened, releasing malware onto your device. They can also trick you into entering your details into a fake website, resulting in you becoming a victim of identity theft. There are also scams that mimic reputable websites, websites that you trust and yet still send about 5 emails a day.
Read more: What 'Transformers' can teach us about enterprise IT security?
Luckily, scam emails are actually quite easy to spot. Many email service providers already have built-in spam detectors that can filter out any suspicious emails instantly. However, these detectors are not always 100 per cent effective.
It is important to stay vigilant and keep your eye out for any suspicious threads. Below are some key points to watch out for.
An example of a scam email from a reputable source.
Read more: How to ensure physical and cyber security when working from home
These are only some of the most common types of scams that are sent out daily to millions of recipients.
The subject lines can say things like ‘ONE (1) UNREAD MESSAGE’ or ‘MALWARE DETECTED’. In this case, it is important to carefully check the sender before opening the email.
Read more: Data protection - Are passwords obsolete?
Finding a suspicious email is nothing to be scared of. Most of us have very public emails that are easily found by scammers. It is important, however, to never open an email you think might contain a scam.
Scam emails are not just dangerous for the scam they are trying to play. They also contain malware that will be activated when the email is opened. This malware can steal your information and sometimes even corrupt your device. If this malware hacks one of your accounts, they will likely gain access to all of your data.
Read more: Protect SMEs in today's competitive and threatful digital economy
A scam email should be deleted after you have blocked the sender. If your email service provider has flagged an email as spam, be sure to tick the ‘this is spam’ option available on most platforms. This will help your email perform better in detecting future threats.
If you have opened a scam email not realising what it was then there are a few important steps you can take to stay safe.
Most email service providers already have built-in spam blockers. These blockers, as you may have noticed, are not perfect, however. It is always important to be cautious when opening emails and be cautious when giving your email to websites with a questionable origin.
Read more: How to protect your data when employees leave
More advanced spam blockers are being developed to keep you safer with no extra effort on your part. Mozilla Firefox is in the process of creating an add-on that will make an email alias whenever you give your email address to a website.
Thus, the website will send emails to the email alias, which will then be forwarded to your actual account. This ensures that the website never receives your actual account information, and therefore, cannot be found by scammers. However, you can track the scammers and find out which website they got your email from. You can cancel the alias account anytime, and your real email account will be safe.
This add-on is still in its development phase when released it will be an easy one-click solution to email protection.
The most important scam blocker, however, is your own eyes. Make sure to regularly check your inbox thoroughly using the tips and tricks outlined in this article.