Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Stealing Personal Information Through Phishing

On a fairly regular basis we get an email sent to us from a business that we do business with, tells us that we must bring up to date personal data on the site. But can you really be sure the company you know is the one asking for information and not a thief? 



Criminal organizations designing websites to look like a company or credit company is becoming a major problem. The sole purpose of these websites is to trick you into giving away information that is personal. Partnership for using websites and e-mails to trick you into revealing your private data is called phishing. Phishing is an important reason to always make use of an identity theft protection company. 



Spotting a phishing e-mail is not as simple as you might think it is. These emails usually look very authentic and will mimic the emails you normally get from the real business. The difference is that when you click a link to a phishing email, you are taken to a site that is there only to steal your identity. 



Phishing websites usually have the same design and feel of the real website. One way to distinguish between simulated and real website is carefully look at the website address. The fraudulent website can get the right website name in his speech, but it will also have additional characters to wallow it is a phishing site. 



The people who come up with phishing sites, most times professional fraudsters. They can afford to spend a lot of money and time to make very real looking sites and e-mails, because a lot of money to be made in stealing personal information. These twenty are out to get you, it's always a good idea to use a combat identity theft plan. 



Because they ultimately want to steal your personal information or other information that can be used to make money, they want to come across as real. These phishing sites will have the same appearance and usability, the actual activities, which include real logos and slogans. 



As the phishing emails and websites may appear to be the real thing, it is often times difficult for people to tell that they are not on the site. The better the amount of work they put criminals in shaping these duping emails and websites, the easier it is for them to trick naive consumers. 



If you do not want to be a victim of a phishing attack, the best thing you can do is never click on links in emails. If you think about the true nature of the email, you can visit the site you would normally. The best way to keep yourself safe from these phishing attacks is to never click on email link in the first game, while the use of an identity theft protection service.

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