CYBER CRIME | Email spoofing fraud a growing concern

Srinagar: The latest in cyber crime is email spoofing fraud and the scammers in these attacks employ strategies like impersonating genuine emails in fraudulent emails and using urgency or alluring offers to entice unwary victims into divulging personal information.

“Emails are an essential part of professional communications and also serve as an identification address. To ensure that communication is encrypted and safe, it is always important to verify the email ID,” officials dealing with cybercrime said here. “Otherwise, you might end up facing cyber-attacks like scams.”

However, they said that no such case had so far been reported at Cyber Police Station Srinagar.

“It (email scam) involves any such email that is intended to defraud someone for personal or professional gains,” officials said.

The email scam messages usually trick victims into making payments using look-alike websites and fraudulent emails.

“These attacks employ strategies like impersonating genuine emails in fraudulent emails and using urgency or alluring offers to entice unwary victims into divulging personal information or downloading malware-filled attachments,” officials said. “Scammers create a fake email account that looked similar to one of the real.”

To protect themselves from phishing attacks, both individuals and businesses must exercise caution and take preventative measures.

Phishing emails can be distinguished from legitimate emails by checking the sender’s email address and looking for suspicious links or attachments.

The possibility of falling victim to phishing attacks could be lessened and personal and professional information could be protected by following best practices and remaining vigilant.

Cyber officials said that email spoofing fraud is mostly used in lottery scams, online dating scams, job scams, and business scams.

The officials said that in business scams the scammer usually pretends to be a trustworthy and revered individual.

“This enables them to deceive the victims into trusting the reliability of the email and obtain sensitive information from them,” they said. “The scammers hack into the email accounts of businesses involved in transactions and steal information about their ongoing deals and orders.”

For their protection against these attacks, businesses must take preventive measures.

Employees can learn to recognise phishing emails and stay away from them by regularly receiving training and awareness programmes.

Antivirus software and spam filters are two tools that can be used to identify and block phishing emails. Strong one-time password requirements and multi-factor authentication can both help to prevent account hacking.

Officials said that in lottery scams, a person receives new mail in the inbox.

“The person opens it and boom,” they said adding that the person is informed that he is the cash prize winner of a lottery. “But the person at some time did not contest or even recall a participation in the contest.”

This is one of the most common types of email scams in India and all around the world.