Wells Fargo Phishing Scam

Written by Kevin A. Lloyd


First off I should explain what phishing is. Phishing is basicallyrepparttar act of tricking a victim into divulging information. It involvesrepparttar 145004 receiving of an email message with a link to a website whererepparttar 145005 victim would enter personal information. In this particular scam, you get an email from "Personal Banking: personalbanking@wellsfargo.com " stating that there may have been some unauthorized access to your account and that you should clickrepparttar 145006 link and enter your account and verify some information. When you clickrepparttar 145007 link you are taken to a site which looks identical torepparttar 145008 Wells Fargo site. If you look atrepparttar 145009 HTML code ofrepparttar 145010 site, you'll notice that they are almost identical. One thing about this scam which was somewhat surprising is thatrepparttar 145011 message made it past my G-mail spam filter. This is slightly different to scams I have seen before in that they don't ask you to reply to this email with your account number like most others, and they don't ask for passwords or anything like that. They simply request that you log in, as you normally do, which would not raiserepparttar 145012 eyebrow of normal users. On a closer inspection ofrepparttar 145013 site you will notice thatrepparttar 145014 forms submitrepparttar 145015 data entered (user name and password) to some foreign script and not to Well Fargo. Most probably,repparttar 145016 scammer is having allrepparttar 145017 usernames and passwords emailed to him. After submission of your informationrepparttar 145018 site responds that your password is incorrect. Here an unsuspecting victim would assume that this was because ofrepparttar 145019 supposed unauthorized access mentioned inrepparttar 145020 email.

If you try to submit information a few more times, it takes you to another Wells Fargo look-alike page called “Online Banking Verification”. Here they ask for SSN number, your ATM card number,repparttar 145021 expiration date,repparttar 145022 pin number andrepparttar 145023 CVV2# (4 digit verification). Withrepparttar 145024 ATM informationrepparttar 145025 scammer could max out your debit card. With allrepparttar 145026 rest ofrepparttar 145027 information he has gathered it would not be at all difficult to call up Wells Fargo and basically take over your account. He could change billing addresses, get checks for you account, and simply wipe it out.

How to spot scams like this

Scams like these are usually easy to spot, but this one in particular was a bit tricky, however there are some basic methods you can use to spot these types of scams.

First of all, checkrepparttar 145028 link. Although it looks likerepparttar 145029 link is going to Wells Fargo’s website, if you letrepparttar 145030 mouse hover overrepparttar 145031 link for a while and look inrepparttar 145032 status bar, you will getrepparttar 145033 real address ofrepparttar 145034 link. In this caserepparttar 145035 scammer used just an IP address of his domain or machine. This, however, can be overridden onrepparttar 145036 internet (ifrepparttar 145037 scammer changesrepparttar 145038 status bar) and sometimes even in your email, depending on what your security settings are.

Charity Fraud

Written by Kevin Carraway


Charity fraud does a lot of harm. The con artist takes advantage of people's good will and takes their cash - money that was meant for people in need. You can make sure that any money you give gets intorepparttar right hands. Just remember these tips when somebody asks you for a donation.

·Ask for identification -repparttar 142906 organization ANDrepparttar 142907 solicitor. Find out whatrepparttar 142908 purpose ofrepparttar 142909 charity is and how funds are used.

·Ask if contributions are tax deductible.

·If you're not satisfied withrepparttar 142910 answers-don't give.

·Give to charities that you know.

·Check outrepparttar 142911 ones you've never heard of before, or others whose names are similar to a well-known charity.

·Don't fall for high-pressure tactics. If solicitors won't take no for an answer, tell them NO anyway - BUT DON'T GIVE THEM YOUR MONEY.

·Be suspicious of charities that only accept cash.

·Always send a check made out torepparttar 142912 charity and notrepparttar 142913 individual requestingrepparttar 142914 donation.

THE PIGEON DROP A person approaches you and says that he just found a large amount of money. What should he do with it? Maybe his "boss" can suggest something. He then leaves to check with his "boss" and comes back a few minutes later. His boss said to dividerepparttar 142915 money, but first, each of you must put up some, "good faith money". Once you hand over your share, you'll never see it orrepparttar 142916 con artist again.

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