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Keep Your Sensitive Information Safe This Holiday Season

Campus Advisory posted

Holiday phishing tricks people into giving out personal information. There is an influx of these attempts, and they disguise themselves as holiday sales, free products/gift cards, and order confirmations for things you didn’t buy in the form of emails. Learn More to Be careful.

With the Holiday Season going on, people are planning to celebrate this year. It’s this time of year when people take time off work to buy gifts or travel, but there is a potential risk that everyone needs to be aware of. There are more vulnerable people at the end of the year when everyone is in a “giving” spirit which is why cyber attacks seem to become more frequent at the end of the year.

Holiday phishing tricks people into giving out personal information. According to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, an influx of these phishing attempts will disguise themselves as holiday sales, free products/gift cards, and order confirmations for things you didn’t buy in the form of emails.

As we approach the holidays, stay vigilant about where you click! If you didn’t order it, it probably isn’t real. This article is about how to help spot phishing emails and how to inspect SMS URL links before clicking. In the meantime, keep the following rules in mind for potential phishing emails. These are often emails that –

  • Are not addressed to you by name.
  • Appear to be from a legitimate company but use poor English or omit personal details that a legitimate sender would include.
  • Are from businesses that you were not expecting to hear from, and/or
  • Take you to a landing page or website that is not the legitimate URL of the company the email is purporting to be sent from.

Please take a moment, back away from your mouse, and think about what you are doing before you click and PAUSE before entering any credentials into a website. Be sure it is legit.