If you receive an email from a unknown source especially from a bank or financial institution and asks you to click on a link then you should check the actual destination page of the link.
Normally spam filter filters such mails but it is always better to check if the email delivered in Inbox. The actual destination of the hyperlink can be checked by looking at the HTML code.
What is Phishing?
Phishing is the criminally fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication.
What makes a hyperlink?
Following code is used to form a hyperlink in which [destination page] is the actual linked URL.
<a href=”[destination page]“>[Link text]</a>
What should check?
The link “ABC Bank Login page” should take you to the bank’s login page. But it may take you to the login page but on a phishing site where your bank login details can be exposed.
<a href=”http://phishingsite.com/login“>ABC Bank login</a>
In this example, the link is saying “ABC Bank login” but in fact the linked URL is “http://phishingsite.com/login” page.
But it may also look like
<a href=”http://www.abcbank.com@167.101.107.111“>ABC Bank</a>
Here the linked URL is http://www.abcbank.com@167.101.107.111 which looks like a correct URL but it is not. This URL will take you to the IP “167.101.107.111″.
It may also look like
<a href=”http://www.abcbank.com.security.phishing.com“>ABC Bank</a>
Which is again looks ok but it will take you to the “phishing.com”. In this URL, “www.abcbank.com.security” part is the sub-domain of “phishing.com”.
and
<a href=”http://www.abcbank.com@%31%36%37%2E
%31%30%31%2E%31%30%37%2E%31%31%31“>ABC Bank</a>
This is a encoded URL. The actual URL is http://www.abcbank.com@167.101.107.111 which goes to http://167.101.107.111.
So until you are very sure of the linked URL better not to use it.
How to check?
If you are accessing your mail in a web browser then the most easiest way to check the destination URL is, take you mouse pointer on the link and the URL will come in the Status bar.
How to prevent?
It is always safer to enter the URL in the browser instead of following the link.
More…
If you know more about email phishing please add it below.
{ 4 comments }
That’s a nice info and according to a survey 8/10 public email service receive such phishing email…and people like us whose email are generally public they receive lots of phishing email…
@p@r@noid – That’s true. I generally get around 100 spams per day in my spam folder.
The fact is spammer use the hacked email ids or create new email id using new domain..So most of the email land into your Inbox..
And most of people click there and 2/10 fall into that scam.
I believe every blogger should write about this post so that general people will be aware of the new scam messages.
that’s true
The email spam filters are getting smart but some spammers manage to fool spam filters.
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