Phishing, pronounced fishing, is now becoming an epidemic throughout the Internet. Most people who use the internet and receive emails have probably received a phishing email or two.

But what is phishing and who are the phishers?

You receive an email from your bank, "Dear bank customer, your bank details need to be verified by clicking on this link......" and so it goes on.

The link that they give you to click on, however, does not open up where you think it should. Although, to all intents and purposes it looks like your banks page, but what is really happening is that your bank details are going straight into a phishers' computer to be used later by them to fleece you of all your money.

There are many of these scams about. The more common ones are for eBay, Paypal and your bank. All of these look very real and to a casual observer or someone new on the Internet, these could be from who they say they are from.

Other scams being used that slightly differ from the above are the emails from a certain son, daughter, or wife. These follow the same pattern more or less. It starts with a terrible accident where their father / husband have been tragically killed with a huge fortune in an offshore bank. They need your help and bank details so that they can transfer millions of US Dollars into your bank so that they can get hold of it.

A variation and one that I have only just started to receive is from a solicitor saying that a long lost relative has left a legacy and the solicitor wants my bank details to be able to transfer this legacy into it.

Some of the worst phishing that has hit the Internet, and the ones that are more likely to succeed are the "Charity" ones.

A web site set up to collect money for well known disasters like Hurricane Katrina or the earthquake that hit India / Pakistan. Of course the money does not go to the good causes that it is meant to go to but goes straight into the Phisher's pocket.

So that is what phishing is and you can now see that the people doing the phishing are none other than criminals.

How can you tell a phishing email or scam?

For the first group, eBay Paypal and Banks it is relatively easy and a little detective work reveals all.

First of all remember that eBay, Paypal or any bank will NEVER ask you for your bank details in an email. By the way, they will not ask you for your log in detail either. Your user name and password are your own private affair and these establishments will not ask you for them.

Secondly, look at how the email addresses you. It will say "Dear eBay user Paypal user or Bank Customer". This is a dead giveaway. Neither eBay nor Paypal (which is owned by eBay) will ever address you such. Their emails will always address you by your user name.

Banks are the same, if you are a customer of a bank, they will address you by your known name. Additionally, banks will not normally email you unless you first give the bank permission.

Finally, for this section, a good way of finding out whether it is a scam is by running your mouse over the link. When you do so you will see a strange web address that bares no relationship with the supposed sender of the email.

For example, you would expect an email from eBay to have a web address that starts ebay.com/">http://www.ebay.com/ not something like ebay.com/blah">https://signin.ebay.com/blah blah blah.

For the second group of scams, the sob sob story type. These are pretty obvious. No one is going to give you money for nothing and ask yourself why would a African Princess or whatever ask for your help in the first place.

If it looks like a scam it usually is a scam.

Someone better than I once said " If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, the chances are it IS a duck.

Finally, for the third group, the charity email that is calling on your good nature to give to a worthy cause. Basically if you feel that you want to support a worthy cause then send money directly to the registered address of that charity. You can look that up on the internet. Or you can go to the charity shops and give money there. You could also buy something and get something back in return.

There are many ways of giving to charity, replying to bogus emails is NOT one of them.

How do you protect yourself?

Be vigilant with all the emails you receive. Delete all the scam ones, or set up a block on them so you don't receive them. If you get the phishing one from eBay, Paypal or the bank, do not on any account click on the link. Forward these direct to the relevant authorities. For eBay and Paypal it is spoof@ and then either eBay.com or Paypal.com Most Internet banks have an email address where you can forward phishing emails and a quick look on their official site will give you their address.

On no account should you reply to these emails. Remember these are Phishing emails and the sender usually does not know whether the email address they sent it to is real or not. They have programs that generate thousands of email addresses and send bulk emails out regularly. If you reply to one they have caught you. There are other ways to get hold of your details and one of these is by installing a Trojan onto your computer. A Trojan is a small malicious program that will record your key strokes and send them off to the person who installed the Trojan.

In days past, Trojans were installed onto computers by opening of emails or opening attachments on emails. These days that need not be the case. Especially with the amount of programs and music that is downloaded from sites. Any one of these could carry a Trojan.

Be sure that you have an anti spyware program and that you keep it up to date. A good quality anti virus program is also a must these days as well. Top of the list though is to have a Fire Wall on your computer.

Windows XP service pack 2 comes with a good firewall and Microsoft have a free anti spyware program that you can download from their site.

There is a tendency for young, and not so young to exchange music files with each other. They do this by allowing others to access their computer directly over the internet.

DON'T DO IT! That is an open invitation to phishers and all unscrupulous people to take control of your computer.

Be on your guard at all times.

Martin Wood

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