The year is 2011. Young Pip is enjoying an afternoon home from school watching YouTube videos and playing his favorite video game, World of Warcraft. While doing some research on what the best leveling talents were for his paladin, he finds a website that promises all the best items, gear, and talents for free! All he has to do is confirm with them that he has an active account by entering in his username and password.
To try and "stick it to the man," Pip decides to enter in some fake details and click "Submit", just to see if the site was legitimate or not. As it turns out, the site was totally fake. It redirected Pip to another page with broken links and poorly formatted images. He chuckles to himself, closes the page, and logs back into World of Warcraft to finish doing dungeons with his friends. After a successful yet sloppy run of Grim Batol, he goes to sleep.
The next day, after coming home from school, Pip notices his paladin is missing all of its armor, weapons and gold. Frantically, he sends an email to World of Warcraft support to try and recover his missing items. Pip was in luck - they restored his items, banned the player who took over his account, and recommended he download AV (anti-virus) software to scan his computer for any sort of infection. Sure enough, the scan showed that by trying to have a little fun and test the waters with that malicious website, clicking "Submit" secretly installed a keylogger onto his computer - a type of malware that tracks the user's keyboard inputs in an attempt to steal passwords. The AV software quarantined the threat, and from then on, Pip made it a habit to scan his computer every weekend to keep his paladin safe from harm.
Does this story sound familiar? Maybe not with a video game, but perhaps with another sensitive account, such as Google, Facebook or even your banking account?
Malware developers across the globe prey on the senses using flashy banners, threats of computer infection, scary emails, and other "click bait" tactics to try and phish for your information every second of every day. Phishing is a type of online scam that involves sending fake emails, texts, or phone calls to trick people into revealing personal information or installing malware. Here are some helpful tips and tricks to stay safe while using your computer!
FAKE WEBSITES
Sometimes, you will run into a website that looks completely real, with proper logo placement and everything, promising you untold riches such as coupons, free handouts, contest winnings or other special offers that are begging for your attention - and your information. Much like with any sort of in-person attempt at scamming, the best thing you can do is walk away. Avoid clicking any links and don't provide any sensitive information unless you are certain it is a legitimate site. If anything looks different than the site you're typically used to, chances are, it's a red herring and should be avoided.
Other times, the website will have JavaScript code in the background that forces the browser to be full screen and play loud sounds to try and coax you to call the phone number on the screen, claiming to be Microsoft, Apple, or another recognizable tech company. Microsoft and other A helpful keyboard macro to memorize is "Alt + F4" for Windows, and "Ctrl + Q" for Apple computers - this will shut down any application you have active and focused on your computer. It's a common prank in online games to try and convince the opponent to press Alt + F4 to gain a competitive edge, but it doubles as a helpful tool to forcibly close any attempts at phishing. However, sometimes, this doesn't work, due to bad software installed on your system - it never hurts to check with your local computer experts if you've gotten a computer infection.
SKETCHY EMAILS
Have you ever received an email that says something about a pending charge on your PayPal account for over $1,000.00? I sure have. Some things that I honed in on to know for certain it was a fake email were the following:
The sender was not from an official PayPal domain; the only domain PayPal will send email from is @paypal.com.
The syntax and formatting on the email was off. It didn't look like columns or rows of the itemized "invoice" it provided were spaced correctly. Alignment looked unprofessional and there were grammatical mistakes in how they detailed their address, costs, and other text in the email.
The email requested I call a phone number to confirm that the charge was fake. PayPal will never ask you to call a phone number for anything, unless you've submitted a ticket on their official website.
Many other similar scams can happen from what seem to be legitimate senders, be it a banking organization, online marketplace like Amazon, or even relatives - your best course of action, especially if the email has any attachments at all - is to avoid clicking any links, calling any phone numbers, or downloading any attachments, then to promptly delete the email.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Recently I was introduced to the realm of AI scams, one specifically being a video of Elon Musk claiming to be giving free money to those who purchase cryptocurrency through a site linked on a YouTube live stream. It seemed very surreal. It was his voice, and his face, making comments about the promised riches, all from what seemed to be the official Tesla YouTube channel.
Looking closer to the channel, however, I saw their channel handle was something similar to @TeslaLX, whereas the official Tesla channel simply has @Tesla as their handle. TeslaLX had a whopping 300,000 subscribers, albeit all fake, to build credibility and make it seem like an authentic channel. It even had posted videos that were identical to the official Tesla account.
The way I was able to identify that it was a fake channel was by simply searching for Tesla in the YouTube search bar - it immediately gave me the official channel towards the top of the search results. It's always important to be thorough with double-checking the legitimacy of content like this. With AI on the rise, there's no telling what evil lurks behind every link.
MALICIOUS DOWNLOADS
If you enter a web address that points to a file instead of a webpage, it will download the file locally to your Downloads folder. Sometimes, websites designed for phishing will download malicious software to your computer without your consent, all because you went to the wrong website. The best way to protect your computer from viruses and other predatory software/programs is to download (and keep up to date) an anti-virus program.
There are tons of AV options floating around the internet. McAfee, Norton, Kaspersky and Avast are some examples. Personally, I prefer Malwarebytes Anti-Malware, as the other AV options I've listed feel a bit clunky and overbearing for what they advertise to do. However, when it comes to AV software, don't feel pressured to install any third-party protection if you don't feel that you need it. The AV protection that is bundled in with any Windows installation is robust and lightweight, and will always keep itself turned on if you don't have any other AV software installed, so you can rest easy that your system is always protected.
CONCLUSION
As long as you practice safe web browsing by not being what the industry calls "a happy clicker" - which is defined as an internet user who quickly clicks through web pages without paying close attention to the content - you will stay safe at every corner of the internet. Don't click on any suspicious links, don't go to sketchy sites, don't give anyone your information unless you're absolutely sure of who's receiving it, and don't open any emails/download any attachments from unknown senders.
As always, if you have any questions or are concerned of a potential infection, you can visit our office or call to schedule an appointment at (405) 292-9501.
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