Emails are one of the favorite tools of scammers to make you divulge your personal information. Learning about some of the common email scams will help you to keep your guard up while working online.
Here are some common email scams that you should be wary of.
Foreign Lottery Scams
This is one of the most common types of email scams. It usually opens with a congratulatory announcement about a huge sum that you have won in a foreign lottery corporation. The scammer will ask for your personal information like full name, date of birth, contact number, and more.
Generally, such emails are sent by an individual and your name is not mentioned in the “To” field. Also, check the name of the lottery in Google to verify if it really exists.
Domain Slamming
This type of email scam target website owners and trick them into purchasing domains. In many cases, the email header is forged to make the mail look genuine. This official-looking mail may mention that your domain is about to expire and you are being offered a “discount” pricing.
In case you fill up the details, you may lose your domain name or end up registering it with a different company at a much higher price. Make sure to check such mails before paying; especially if they come with dire warnings about renewal time running out.
Survey Scam
This is a scam that is disguised in the form of a survey. It’s possible that you might show interest in social issues like drug abuse or global warming. So, the email will ask you to participate in a survey to help out the cause.
While this may look innocent, clicking on the survey link attached to the mail might download some malicious software on your computer. Unless you are completely sure about the authenticity of the sender, don’t click on any links sent by email.
Credit Card or PayPal Scam
You might receive an email stating that there has been a security breach in your credit card or PayPal account. The mail will contain a link that’s supposed to direct you to your PayPal account to address the issue. Obviously, this is a trap to direct you to another similar-looking website and give up your PayPal user id and password.
It’s best to check the sender’s email id and the linked URL to make sure that they are authentic. Also, no legitimate business will threaten to close your account if you don’t respond to the email.