How to avoid being a victim of Scammers and Hackers

Scammers and Hackers have become part of our every day life. Everybody who owns an email account has received at least one email from a scam artist looking for their next victim. Most of us are already aware of the dating scams and the damsel in distress scams where someone tells you that they are stranded in a foreign country and just happen to come across your contact details. Those formats have become well known and the average person already recognises those stories.

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However, as the world gets wiser, so do the scammers. They are constantly refining their tactics and getting more creative with their stories. I remember a story from when I was at university. It was a Coop term and my friends and I were seriously looking for jobs in order to fulfil the requirements of our Coop term. This one friend of mine was especially nervous because, unlike most of us, she did not have any prior work experience so companies were unwilling to even interview her.
She combed our university careers website each day looking for a job opportunity but to no avail. One day, just like magic, she received an email from a company. The email said that she was hired to be a personal assistant for an Entrepreneur. However, she had to complete a one month probation period and based on her performance, she would be converted to a full-time employee. She was so excited and quickly informed me about it. I was very happy to hear about her new job so I asked what specifically she will be required to do. This is when the story got interesting. She told me that her boss would send her some cheques, one of them would be for her first month’s salary. She was supposed to deposit all the cheques in her account, retain her salary, purchase some office supplies and then send the cash balance to her boss’s address. Immediately I heard this, all the red flags went up. The sirens started blaring and everything in me shouted Scam! Scam!

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I felt bad that I was about to be the party pooper but I had to say something. I revealed my suspicions to her as gently as I could, and I told her to let me know when she receives the cheques. The cheques came in the mail and I must admit, everything about it looked legit. We called the police and after hearing my friend’s story, they confirmed that this was a scam.

So as you can see, scammers have resorted to preying on university students under the guise of giving them a job. There are several other stories like this and I just wanted to give a few pointers on how to spot a scam or prevent being a victim of hackers.

Always Verify the Sender’s Email.

Most scammers would try to contact you via email. In doing so, some would try to pass themselves off as someone important or an important organisation in your life. You may receive an email from someone posing as a representative from your bank. They might say something along the lines of “Your credit card has been used to purchase … If you did not authorise this transaction, log in to your account to deactivate your credit card”. Then, they would provide you with a link to a website where every information you enter will be stolen.

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Whenever I receive an email from someone claiming to be affiliated to my bank, I always check the sender’s email. If you are like me and you use an iPhone, when you open the email, the sender’s name will be displayed at the top. My tip to you is to never trust that name, instead, click on the name to view the sender’s email. While examining the sender’s email, make sure that the domain name is from the institution that the person claims to represent. For example, look for [email protected] instead of [email protected] or [email protected]

You can see how easy it is to mislead a person who may not be paying close attention to the email address.
I must say that I recently had an experience that honestly puzzled me and continues to puzzle me until this day. I received an email from a person who claimed to be a representative from my bank. The email requested that I pay a certain amount of money through a link that I was not familiar with. I applied the above test (which works 99% of the time) but the email that was attached to the name looked like it came from my bank! I am 100% sure that this was a scam because my bank confirmed that they did not send that email. So how did this criminal achieve that? How was he/she able to send an email from an account that had my banks domain address? I don’t know and I would appreciate any help from people who do know.

Do not click on links sent by friends

It’s funny how a lot of these scenarios have actually played out either in my life or in the life of someone close to me. A few months ago, I received a Facebook message from someone who is a member of my dance class and also had recently battled cancer and won. The link mentioned my name and said something around the lines of “check yourself out in this video LOL”. For a brief second, I thought it was odd that she was referring to me by both my first and last name, but brushed it aside. Moreover, she has been known to take videos of us while we are dancing so I thought nothing of it and I clicked on the link. After doing that, I was redirected to a Facebook login page.

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This is when the famous alarm bells started blaring. Why didn’t it just play the video? Why did it have to take me to a log in page? Looking closely at the login page, I noticed that the colour of page was a slightly different blue than regular Facebook. At this point, I quickly closed the browser on my phone, opened my computer and changed my Facebook password. My friend later confirmed that her account was hacked and all her Facebook friend received one of those links. From then onwards, I have learned never to click on links that are sent to me even if they are sent to me by friends. In a case where the link looks like it genuinely came from my friend, I would first confirm with them that they sent it before I eventually click on the link.

Do not access sensitive websites using public Wi-Fi

We all get this warning every time we attempt to connect to a public Wi-Fi especially during long waits at the airport. However, not all of us heed this warning. We get complacent and carry on our normal browsing habits, forgetting how unsecure the information transmitted using these public access points are. It is not to say that everyone who has accessed their online banking platform using public hotspots will have their password stolen, it just increases the chances of that happening. This one is simple. If you feel the urge to check if your paycheck has arrived while at the airport (for example), don’t do it.

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These are my tips to avoid being the victim of scammers and hackers. Please feel free to add your experience to the comment section.

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