Phishing Awareness

Phishing is a type of social engineering attack where malicious actors impersonate trustworthy entities (like banks, security teams, or employers) to trick individuals into sharing sensitive credentials, personal identifying information (PII), or financial data.

These attacks are primarily delivered via emails, but they also take the form of SMS messages (known as Smishing) and voice calls (Vishing). Phishers exploit human psychology, leveraging factors like trust, curiosity, or fear to force immediate actions.

To protect yourself, you must inspect all messages for common indicators of deception:

• Urgent or Threatening Tone: Asking you to verify your identity or update banking information immediately, or face account suspension.

• Deceptive Sender Domains: Check the exact sender domain. For example, secure-paypal.support-verify.com instead of paypal.com. Attackers buy domains that look almost identical (typosquatting).

• Generic Greetings: Valid companies usually address you by your full registered name rather than "Dear Customer" or "Valued Member".

• Suspicious Hyperlinks: Hover your cursor over links (without clicking) to inspect the actual destination URL in your browser status bar.