PHISHING

Checking through my mail box I saw a catchy headline. It was tagged Account Review.

‘’Dear valued customer,

You have been successfully migrated to the new FirstOnline, our enhanced internet banking solution. Kindly update all your records with us correctly to prevent service interruption/suspension. Kindly follow the below instruction…”

At another time, it was a mail claiming to come from Zenith bank requesting that I reactivate my internet banking account or risk being deactivated; an account I never had with them.  I checked the link and it was a site designed like the bank’s website with the intention of sapping bank details from gullible customers. It is no news that scammers abound and one of the methods they use is Phishing.
 Phishing according to Wikipedia.org is described as the attempt to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, password, and credit card details (and sometimes, indirectly, money) by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication. They rely on the confidence customers have on their banks or service providers to kowtow them into falling to their traps. They do these by sending spam mails and bulk SMS to random email addresses and phone numbers.

The mails they send concerning account activation from banks often lead to fake websites (the scammers’ predesigned websites). The websites are designed to get bank information from ignorant lots. When people send their account details in the name of upgrading their account then the scammers use the details to do e-commerce transactions from the victims’ account. 

Sometimes our phones beep and when we check we discovered we just got a message. When we open the SMS, yippee! We have won N300,000 from LaCasera promo. I once got that message and then I sat down and asked myself. When was the last time you bought LaCasera drink? That was in 2012 on my way from Benin to Lagos; there are more loyal customers who could have won the promo. I went through the message again; I was instructed to call one Pastor Wale (using a man of God’s name to make you think it’s for real) to redeem my prize. I decided to hear what Pastor Wale has for me, when I called he told me to send my account details with N3000 worth of recharge card in the denomination of 1500. I asked what that was meant for, he told me that would be used to cover the logistics. Few days afterward, customers began to call in to confirm if LaCasera actually had an ongoing promo. Some had already fallen prey by sending cards while some wanted to confirm before proceeding.

How do we detect these “Phishy” mails or SMS?

·         They send promo you never applied or are eligible for

·          They send account upgrade for banks you don’t  have an account with

·         They do not take time to edit their messages, so there are sometimes spelling & grammar errors

·          They use spurious website that don’t bear the name of the company involved

·         They request for credits or incentives before you can get the acclaimed promo

·         They sometimes make use of threat of possible deactivation on failure to upgrade

·         The mail addresses they use to send the spam mails don’t usually bear the bank host name.

Many people have been duped out of their ignorance, a majority of pensioners fall victim of activation fraud thinking they are actually dealing with their bank. Some fall victim out of greed and love for free service. These set of people don’t usually ask for information before they proceed and after they have been duped they begin to seek knowledge. Some are also lured because of the threat in the tone of the mail, they believed they may experience service/account deactivation if they do not comply.

Nothing is absolutely free. If it is free at the receiver’s end, it not free at the giver’s end, hence, we should not be quick to claim free gifts, awoof dey run belle sometimes.