Description: Listing off types of popular scams you should be aware of and how to prevent them from happening to you.
Introduction
Most people like to think that scams only work on those gullible enough to fall for them, but that’s not always the case. Some of the most cautious people can still fall victim to well-constructed schemes. Scammers use all types of techniques to try and get your data, whether by using malware to hack into your computer when you click on a link, or by having you give them the money yourself because they had disguised themselves as someone you would typically trust like a police station or bank. But scammers don’t only target regular civilians, some go as far as to target small businesses through their online channels. Internet scams caused “more than $10.2 billion in losses due to internet crimes in 2022” alone. To prevent yourself and yourself from becoming a part of those losses, reading through this article will help inform you about what type of popular scams you should look out for and how you can protect yourself and your business from them.
Popular Scams
Phish1ing
Phishing scams are the most popular scams out there. Over 4.5 billion attacks were observed in 2022 alone. Phishing scams can be done in a number of ways, with the most popular form of it being sent in email or texts. Have you ever gotten a weird email asking you to sign up for something or a text asking you to click on a link? More likely than not, those messages were a phishing scam attempt on you. Hopefully, you didn’t click on them and simply block the sender, but if you had, you are opening yourself up to so many potential issues. Links and emails can hold malware or viruses inside them, so if you had clicked on the link, you would have opened a doorway for scammers to hack into your devices and steal your information, or more likely as a business owner, they would have locked you out of your website until you paid a fine. This specific example is called Ransomware, but you can see how one little link can really put you and your business in danger.
Pharming
Cousin to phishing scams, pharming scams are online frauds that manipulate website addresses to redirect users to malicious sites without their knowledge, which has recently become very popular scams. This poses a serious threat as it causes there to be mistrust in online interactions and afflicts business relationships with their users and the user’s security. More well-orchestrated attacks like these are more commonly done by cybercriminals, so you have to be extra cautious when clicking on mysterious URLs. While pharming attacks are a bit harder to identify, the steps are quite similar. Before you click on the URL of a website, make sure that the link has HTTPS encryption and that there aren’t any misspellings or irregularities.
How to Protect Yourself from Being Scammed
Phish1ng
To help prevent yourself from becoming a victim of a phishing attack, when you receive an odd email or text, the best practice is to simply block the sender without even going into the message. If the email or message looks like it could be something important, like a bill or an alert from a bank, check to make sure that the sender uses proper grammar, the sender’s email is legit, and that it’s not asking you to give any personal information in the email itself. Most banks ask that you check out your account on their website rather than asking for the information there.
Pharming
Using reputable security software and constant vigilance can help prevent pharming attacks from happening to you. By keeping your device updated and having multi-factor authentication on your data can help prevent disaster even if you do accidentally click on a pharming website. It also helps to stay informed on popular scams like these so you know what to look out for while you are roaming the internet.