Extraordinary online caution needed this holiday season
I wanted you all to be aware (in case you don't already know) that cyber-criminals are planning all out attacks against online consumers this holiday season, and they have already begun. Everything from phishing scams, to social engineering via tricky email messages, to the outright theft of transaction databases by exploiting servers is being rolled out to try to take your money and identity. Please treat all strange email subjects and senders as potential threats, not just objects of curiosity. Also, whatever your operating system your computer uses, please keep it updated with all current patches, to reduce your chances of getting exploited by a threat in the wild.
If you intend to make an online purchase, use a credit card if you have one, as most issuers limit your liability to $50, in the event your numbers are stolen and used fraudulently. There may or may not be similar protection on your debit cards, and if a cyber-criminal wipes out your bank account, you may have to wait a long time to get the money credited back, if it is at all.
Do not fall victim to Nigerian 419 scammers, whether it is the advance fee to claim funds scam, the lottery scam, the over-payment/refund scam, the money-laundering work-at-home check cashing scam, or other variations used by the World's foremost scammers.
Do not click on links in unsolicited emails, to view cute animals, or sports trackers, or eCards, or postcards, especially numeric URL links! The Storm Trojan BotMasters use these tricks to infect your PC and make it part of the World's largest Botnet, to date. If such an email arrives from a sender you know, send them a message asking if they actually sent that email to you. Chances are that they have no knowledge of that message being sent in their name. Heck, I get spam emails supposedly from my account names to the same accounts (but the sender's name is random characters or a non-existent user name)! Spammers use forged senders and reply to addresses in all of their messages now. There is no point in replying to them to complain, because, either the sender is unaware their name was used, or the account does not actually exist on that mail server.
eBay, PayPal, bank and credit union phishing scams are being ramped up, in anticipation of huge rewards during the upcoming Christmas buying season. Ditto for probes against online credit card databases.
One of the main reasons there is such a huge increase in the amount of spam this Winter, especially a lot of nasty stuff, is because the criminals behind these messages are hiding behind compromised personal computers that they have drafted into their BotNets. They do not fear being tracked down because they have created a virtual firewall between the command centers, the zombie computers and themselves. These people usually live in countries where the law turns a blind eye to such activities, as long as they don't use the Botnet against their own people, or governments. A lot of them speak Russian as their native language.
Keep your defenses up this shopping season. Use spam filters, like MailWasher Pro (which I use), to filter out as much spam and scam email as possible, to reduce your exposure to email-borne threats. Keep regularly updated versions of anti virus and anti spyware programs on Windows based PCs (see graphic image ads on this page for reputable security products), and set your computer to receive Windows Updates automatically. Do not run as an administrator while browsing the Internet or reading email. It is dangerous, whether your operating system is Windows, Mac or Linux. Use Limited User, Power User or User privileges instead, and learn how to escalate to administrator level only as and when needed. I have an entire article about creating limited user accounts here. Read it and learn to protect your PC.
Each well secured computer is one less zombie in a Botnet, and hopefully, one less identity theft victim. Have a safe and happy holiday season!
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