Talk to Clark 1-4pm ET: (877) 87-CLARK or (404) 872-0750
advertisement
Looking for something on the site? Search for it here! Also see Clark's Greatest Hits
Oct 23, 2008 -- Phishing scams get a new life after bank failures
RIP-OFF ALERT: Scamsters have been getting very sophisticated in their phishing attempts following the numerous bank failures in our nation. Clark himself says he received a phishing attempt that looked very legitimate after the Wachovia collapse.
Here's one example of what's been going on: Within minutes of the original plan for Citibank to take over Wachovia, the scamsters were blasting out e-mails. Each message said that in order to access your Wachovia account, you'd have to fill out an online form that asked for all kinds of personal info. Unfortunately, many people fell for it because they were dumbfounded by the news of the day about Wachovia.
Meanwhile, The Los Angeles Times report that British researchers have found sophisticated phishing scams such as this one have a 90% success rate. That's really scary!
The takeaway here is that you should never reply to any supposedly legitimate e-mail from a financial institution asking for personal info. Nor should you ever click on a hyperlink in an e-mail that supposedly takes you to your bank or brokerage house's website. If you are in doubt, close out the e-mail in question; open a new browser window; and type the URL directly to verify the info contained in the e-mail.
Think you may have already given up sensitive info? Then immediately contact your financial institution and tell them you need to restrict access to your account.
Unfortunately, Clark won't be able to answer any questions submitted via commenting. If you have a question, please try posting it to our message boards.
Avg. rating: N/A
What others are saying
phishing
PLEASE REPORT THIS TO WHOEVER
From: Charles Obi [mailto:charlesobi69@yahoo.com] Sent: Thursday, October 08, 2009 5:21 AM Subject: CONTACT WESTERN UNION NOW
Attention ,
We have concluded to effect your payment of $850 00.00 dollars(EIGHT HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS) through western union, but the maximium amount you will be receiving each day starting from tomorrow is $5,000.00 daily until the funds is completely transfered.Kindly Contact Western union Agent:
MR. Nelson B.Collins TEL: +229-98349818 E-mail: wuservicedept@sify.com
Though, Nelson Collins sent $5,000.00 in your name today so contact Mr.Nelson B.Collins and tell him to give you the Mtcn, sender name and question/answer to pick the $5,000.00. Pls let me know as soon as you received all your funds $850,000.00 thousand dollars Thank you.send to him the below information ASAP.
1.YOUR FULL NAME........................ 2.YOUR HOME ADDRESS..................... 3YOUR CURRENT HOME..................... TELE PHONE NUMBER......................
Yours
MR.NOBERT OFORDIKE.
Latest e-mail 5/06/09
This was sent to my spam/bulk mail from alerts@citibank.com to an e-mail account that isn't even registered to my actual Citibank credit card.
This is a Security Alert you requested to help you protect your account.
Your account has been limited. You have exceeded the number of three (3) failed login attempts.
To unlock your account, please login to your account
Thank you for your cooperation.
Citibank Service Center Attn: E-mail/Internet Services 100 Citibank Drive Building 3, 1st Floor San Antonio, TX 78245
New Phishing Scam
----Original Message----- From: Webmaster Support [mailto:webmaster@emailupgrade.info] Sent: Wednesday, March 25, 2009 11:57 AM Subject: ***SPAM***
Dear E-mail Account Owner,
This message comes from your (EMAIL SERVICE PROVIDER) messaging admincentreto All E-mail Account owners. We are currently improving our Database and E-mailAccount Center and creating more certainty for our Legal Service clients.
At this moment we are upgrading our data base so that there will be morespacefor new customers and increasing the surf on the Internet. To preventyourWebmail or email address not to be de-activated and to enable it upgraded, youneed toassist us by sending the information below to enable us upgrade it, sothat your email account status were flect in our database as a very active,useful and legal email account.
Do send to us the below information to enable us upgrade your Account,else your email account will lost in a short time.
User Name Email: E-mail password:
WARNING!!! E-MAIL OWNERS who refuses to upgrade his or her account within Five days after notification of this update will permanently be deleted from ourdatabase and can also lead to malfunctioning of the client or user's accountand we will not beresponsible for loosing our account.
Thanks for your understanding as it is geared towards serving you better.
Email Messaging Support Team Warning Code: ID67565434
email from BOA
"Dear valued cust we were unable to active you acct because we have upgrded our systm. Click here to continue."
I do not now nor have I ever had an acct with BOA.
Need Clark experise on Travel
I'm a single mom of three. I want to take my kids on an airplane. We, I, don't care where we go as long as it's cheap. It seems every site wants dates and locations. All I want is a weekend stay with a car and we fly to get there. Can you help me?
Email Phishing received
This is what I received:
Alerting Service
Customer Notification
Dear CitiBusiness customer, We have released a new version of CitiBusiness Form (CBF). Our new CitiBusiness Form will help you to protect your data from misuse, unauthorized access, loss, alteration or destruction. This form is required to be completed by all CitiBusiness customers.
Please follow these steps:
1.Open the form at http://businessaccess.citibank.citigroup.com/cbusol/form.do?id=876986262631352834316090351389967334107812182480388348. 2.Follow given instructions.
Please understand that we cannot respond to individual messages through this email address.
