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Health & Fitness

6 Tips to Avoid Email Scams

Emails provides us with one of the most convenient and powerful avenues to communicate with other members of our community. However, it is quite unfortunate to note that email is the favored platform for scammers and other malicious individuals. Scammers have advanced from their old-fashioned bait-and-switch tactics to phishing schemes using a combination of both scam emails and bogus sites in an attempt to obtain your sensitive personal information. Unfortunately, the majority of people who have fallen victim of such email scams fell victim due to lack of internet safety knowledge . There are several tips to avoid email scams, here is a list that will surely help you.

Tip #1: Watch out for email attachments
This is one of the most important steps you should take if you want to avoid email scams. In most occasions, you might receive emails from people you hardly know with attachments that contain malicious files. Such files contain malware that forces your computer to send emails containing your personal information. Therefore, it is very important that you only open emails with attachments from people you know.

Tip #2: Filter Spam
You should take the necessary measures to prevent spam emails from getting into your mailbox. The majority of email scams begin with such unsolicited commercial emails. You can accomplish this using email applications and email services that filter spam or by configuring your email application to filter scam email automatically. Many common email services such as gMail offer spam protection for free.

Tip #3: Install a personal firewall and keep it up to date
Installing a personal firewall is not a guarantee that scam emails will not find their way into your mailbox. However, it may help you if it happens that you open a scam email or an email bearing a malware as an attachment inadvertently. Nevertheless, you should ensure that the firewall is up to date if you want to rest assured of maximum protection always. Windows XP first introduced Windows Firewall, and all newer versions of Windows offer this Service for free.

Tip #4: Be on the lookout for links in your emails
 Nowadays, the majority of scammers have shifted to sending their victims emails with links to external websites. This means that, the link is to act as bait, prompting you to visit an external website that steals the information you enter. Such websites can also attempt to download malware into your computer. It is for this reason that you shouldn't open any unsolicited commercial emails containing links to an external website. These emails often appear to originate from legitimate websites such as Paypal, eBay or even your bank. Instead of clicking the link inside the email, simply visit the website (if it is a trusted site) through your web browser, or call customer service to confirm the issue noted in the email.

Tip #5: Watch out for poor spelling and grammar
The majority of scam emails do not originate from English speakers but from people in countries who are non-English speaking. Unlike legitimate emails from banks, social websites etc scam emails from cybercriminals often contain a lot of grammar and spelling errors. You should therefore disregard any email with very poor spelling and grammar. However, do not assume a well written email is legitimate, scammers are notorious for copying and pasting content directly from legitimate websites.

Tips #6: Use your common sense
Some emails that arrive in your mailbox contain unrealistic information. For instance, some might promise you a lump sum of money for just a little effort or ask you to join in a plot to grab a certain amount of unclaimed cash in a country you don't know. You should therefore take a moment to consider the likelihood that such an email is indeed legitimate before proceeding, otherwise report it.

Brought to you by:
Sean Coyne
Coyne Enterprises LLC
http://www.coyneenterprises.org

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