How to Spot and What to do About Spam
The silly season is upon us again (funny how it always coincides with school and college/university holidays) and email boxes around the world are getting filled up with various forms of malicous mail.
There many types of SPAM (the generic title for junk email messages):
- Advertising useless or illegal products or services
- Advertising fake goods/services - cigarettes, perfume, viagra etc
- Emails claiming to come from an actual or offical body of some sorts (like PayPal, the big Banks etc)
- Stuff claiming you have won a lottery you never entered or are the beneficiary from a relative you never had
- Stuff claiming your pc/email is infected and use their software to clean it up
- And stuff aimed at businesses claiming that either your website is rubbish, that you will never get to the top in Google or that if you don't give the crooks who sent the message all your money your business will forever be hurt.
In almost every case, these messages are sent out in the hope of either destroying your website/business or stealing money/identity from you. They are dangerous and you should take serious notice of this stuff and make sure your computer and website are as safe as they can be.
Was a time crime gangs carried guns and wore striped jerseys. Not any more, they use the Internet and very profitable it is to them.
I have a number of Rules that I stick to and if you you do too, you will minimise your exposure to this rubbish and save yourself a lot of agony and quite probably, a lot of money.
Rule 1.
If it looks too good to be true, it most certainly is.
Cigarettes, pharmaceuticals and perfumes all have known prices. Yes they are genuine deals to be had but these will always be promotions sponsored and paid for by the real manufacturers.
For the items (advertised on the Internet and in emails) to be that cheap, they have to be fakes.
Fake cigarettes will probably mean you get cancer earlier than you would otherwise.
Fake perfume may harm your skin.
Fake pharmaceuticals could kill you immediately.
It is just not worth taking the risk. And all of this stuff is pedalled by major crime syndicates.
As for the lottery & long lost relative scams, these are all designed to part you with all of your money - not just the price of a pack of fake cigs!
There is no such thing as a free lunch and there is not a single person in the world going to give you a single penny without you having to jump through many hoops to get it.
If you see emails like this - just delete them straight away. Most email clients (that is the software you use to access email from your pc, laptop or mobile) allow you to read at least part of what the message is about without actually opening the message.
Rule 2.
Many of these scam/spam emails contain links to websites. They may look genuine but most certainly are not. These links are designed to cause you and your pc/laptop/mobile nothing but harm.
They could be the method the criminal (notice I do not call them spammers) uses to get you to download a virus to damage your system.
Or a trojan which contains software enabling them to hi-jack your system and use it to cause additional damage to others (your contacts).
Or it could be a phishing attempt - the link contains software designed to search your system for banking and other identity details.
Many of this type of email claim to come from Banks, Building Societys, PayPal etc. Remember, none of these organisations will ever contact you by email unless you have pre-agreed that they can.
None (of the genuine organisations) will address the email to Dear Customer (or similar).
But even if it is addressed to you by your real name check the email thoroughly before clicking the link. Are the account details actually yours? If not - do not click that link!
Basically remember this - never click a link in an email unless you know for sure who sent the message. And you have to be very, very sure.
Rule 3.
Invest money in good quality Anti Virus & Firewall software for your pc and make sure you have it enabled and kept up to date (at all times).
There are a small number of legitimate security software companies and 100's of crooked sites claiming to offer security products.
And remember, any security software is only as good as the updates it gets. New threats, viruses, trojans etc appear every hour of every day. Software that is updated once a year is about as much use as a chocolate fire guard.
Rule 4.
There is no such thing as too much security. Layers of security are better than single pieces of software.
As stated above, new threats are created daily - if one software package is updated weekly and another daily, having both increases your chances of defeating the threats.
Yes you really must have Anti-Virus software and you really should have a decent Firewall (not the free one supplied by Microsoft - that is OK till you get software from a security specialist).
Spam Catcher software is also a wise investment. It identifies from a predetermined set of criteria what it thinks is Spam and puts that into a special folder on your email client. You can then review the emails by looking at the messages (but not opening them fully) to determine whether it is genuine - in which case you move it back to the Inbox or is what you think to be Spam - in which case you delete it. Takes quite a lot of the pain out of spotting Spam.
But it would also make sense to have an Ad Catcher and/or Malware Catcher (software designed to identify and deal with threats disguised as adverts or articles but also worms, bots, keyloggers and a whole lot more).
And why not add in some quality pc maintenance software such as a Disk Defragmenter (this compresses the data used on your system to a smaller area and frees up memory storage space for future use).
A Spyware remover is also sensible - does what it says on the tin. Some so-called Spyware is not really harmful, but much of it is very harmful. You do not need any of it, so get a software product that will constantly monitor your system and remove Spyware when found.
A Privacy sweeper and Registry fixer & Junk File deleter are useful too - the first removes things that can tell the Internet or Emails all about you and the second two make sure that stuff you have deleted is actually no longer a threat to you.
Rule 5.
Not really a rule but something to remember:
The criminals create many things - viruses, adware, trojans, keyloggers, bots, worms - but not one of them is anything you really want. All are designed to rip you off or cause permanent harm to your system.Some are created by stupid people who have the brains to create "because they can" but not the sense to know they shouldn't.
But most are created by criminal gangs whose sole intention is to either deprive you of all your money or deprive you of your identity, so they can deprive others of money and identities.
Rule 6.
This is the most valuable piece of software that you should always apply when working online - common sense.
A genuine supplier of security software will happily display their location and contact details on a website and include them in emails. Criminals will always want to hide behind false details or display no contact details at all.
If you get a suspicious email and it includes an "Unsubscribe Link" - do NOT click it, it is yet another attempt by the criminals to capture your details.
The only sensible thing to do with all suspicous emails is to note their content and delete them.
Some organisations like, PayPal, allow you to forward suspicous emails to them (for PayPal send them to spoof@paypal.com) and they will check out the email and if it is an attempt at phishing etc they will use the details to try and track down and prosecute the criminals. Once again, immediately after you have forwarded the dodgy email delete it. Retaining it on your system can leave you open to further attack.
Conclusion
Learn to spot the threats, make sure you invest wisely to protect yourself, always ensure you have the latest version of security software and never ever become complacent.
This information is provided without warranty and is based on experience of Internet use.