The Come-Back, Day 31. Gone Phishing.
How interesting. I checked my emails today on my phone, and looked into the spam folder, in case a legitimate one had gone missing. There was one there from PayPal. It was telling me my account had been limited due to suspicious activity, and to open an attachment.
Since I had made a payment with PayPal the previous day, my first reaction was that someone had somehow gotten into it. The next, that the payment was being stalled because the receiver seemed fishy. Once, some years ago, I bought something online with my credit card, and the bank called me to know if I had really done the transaction. They were holding it up until I replied because it seemed fishy to them. So, I thought that PayPal might be doing the same thing.
But, since I don't like opening attachments on emails unless I ask for them, I looked at it more closely. The sender was simply PayPal Inc. and the message was in correct English. On the email they had sent me the day before, telling me the payment had successfully been made, the sender was servicio@paypal.es. The logo on the new mail was also not the official logo. And, until this point, even though I have entered the PayPal page in English, the company has always automatically given me the page in Spanish, as well as being the language in every email from them. Someone was phishing.
Once I opened my email on the computer, it was obvious. Somehow, Yahoo is much more careful on the computer monitor than on my phone. On the computer, Yahoo added the warning that the file could not be opened because of possible fraud attempts. To open it, I would have to move the file to the incoming box.
My first instinct was to report this to the police, to add to their knowledge, and to the next warning they send out to the public to be careful on the internet. I had no way of doing so. On the web page of the Policía Nacional, there was no link to report it. I could report a crime via email, but that page wouldn't open, and I could see no other way of sending them the information. In the end, I had to exit their page and ask Google, "como denunciar un intento de phishing" (how to report a phishing attempt). Once I did that, the first result was the corner of the Policía's web page where I could type out what I wanted them to be aware of. Who designs the web pages for the government institutions? Houdini?
During the lockdown, with many more people going online, and falling in love with Amazon and other merchandise-pushing webs, phishing has had a big increase. And phishing is ever so much more profitable than just plain fishing. Create a reasonable facsimile of a proper web page, and you can really pull in the flounder. There have been many warnings on the news these past months to be careful on the internet. Some older people have had to have crash courses on the subject, especially after they were taken in by someone much more computer-savvy than them.
While the coronavirus has taken many lives, and ruined a lot of the world economically, it seems to have brought ill-gotten riches to others. It truly is an ill wind that blows no good. Though I wish this wind had been ill to the phishers, not the phishees.
Life continues. Keep an eye open on the net.
Since I had made a payment with PayPal the previous day, my first reaction was that someone had somehow gotten into it. The next, that the payment was being stalled because the receiver seemed fishy. Once, some years ago, I bought something online with my credit card, and the bank called me to know if I had really done the transaction. They were holding it up until I replied because it seemed fishy to them. So, I thought that PayPal might be doing the same thing.
But, since I don't like opening attachments on emails unless I ask for them, I looked at it more closely. The sender was simply PayPal Inc. and the message was in correct English. On the email they had sent me the day before, telling me the payment had successfully been made, the sender was servicio@paypal.es. The logo on the new mail was also not the official logo. And, until this point, even though I have entered the PayPal page in English, the company has always automatically given me the page in Spanish, as well as being the language in every email from them. Someone was phishing.
Once I opened my email on the computer, it was obvious. Somehow, Yahoo is much more careful on the computer monitor than on my phone. On the computer, Yahoo added the warning that the file could not be opened because of possible fraud attempts. To open it, I would have to move the file to the incoming box.
My first instinct was to report this to the police, to add to their knowledge, and to the next warning they send out to the public to be careful on the internet. I had no way of doing so. On the web page of the Policía Nacional, there was no link to report it. I could report a crime via email, but that page wouldn't open, and I could see no other way of sending them the information. In the end, I had to exit their page and ask Google, "como denunciar un intento de phishing" (how to report a phishing attempt). Once I did that, the first result was the corner of the Policía's web page where I could type out what I wanted them to be aware of. Who designs the web pages for the government institutions? Houdini?
During the lockdown, with many more people going online, and falling in love with Amazon and other merchandise-pushing webs, phishing has had a big increase. And phishing is ever so much more profitable than just plain fishing. Create a reasonable facsimile of a proper web page, and you can really pull in the flounder. There have been many warnings on the news these past months to be careful on the internet. Some older people have had to have crash courses on the subject, especially after they were taken in by someone much more computer-savvy than them.
While the coronavirus has taken many lives, and ruined a lot of the world economically, it seems to have brought ill-gotten riches to others. It truly is an ill wind that blows no good. Though I wish this wind had been ill to the phishers, not the phishees.
Life continues. Keep an eye open on the net.
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