From email to instant messaging to social media, the Internet is an essential communication tool. Unfortunately, it’s also popular among scammers and cybercriminals. To protect yourself from email scams, malicious software, and identity theft, you’ll need to understand how to identify and avoid potentially dangerous content in your inbox, including spam and phishing attempts.

Dealing with spam

If you’ve ever received unwanted email advertisements, you may already be familiar with spam, also known as junk email. Spam messages can clutter your inbox and make it more difficult to find the emails you actually want to read. Even worse, spam often includes phishing scams and malware, which can pose a serious risk to your computer. Fortunately, most email services now include several features to help you protect your inbox from spam.

Spam filters

Whenever you receive an email, most email providers will check to see if it’s a real message or spam. Any likely spam messages will be placed in the spam folder so you don’t accidentally open them when checking your email.

Spam-blocking systems aren’t perfect, though, and there may be times when legitimate emails end up in your spam folder. We recommend checking your spam folder regularly to make sure you aren’t missing any important emails.

Phishing

Phishing scams are messages that try to trick you into providing sensitive information. These often appear to come from a bank or another trusted source, and they’ll usually want you to re-enter a password, verify a birth date, or confirm a credit card number. Phishing messages may look real enough at first glance, but it’s surprisingly easy for scammers to create convincing details.

More details will follow on Phishing and how to avoid it.

Other common email scams

Spam and phishing are common problems, but there are many other types of email scams you may encounter. Some will promise to give you a lot of money if you advance a small amount upfront. Others may pretend to be from people you know in real life, and they’ll often ask you to send money or download an attached file.

As with spam and phishing scams, remember to trust your best judgement. You should never send someone money just because you’ve received an email request. You should also never download email attachments you weren’t expecting because they might contain malware that could damage your computer and steal your personal information.

Spam, scams, and phishing schemes will continue to evolve and change. But now that you know what to look for—and what to avoid—you can keep your inbox and computer that much safer.

How to avoid malware

Malware is one of the most common hazards to your computer when you’re online, but it’s easy to avoid. Developing safe and smart browsing habits can protect you from malware and other threats, like viruses. Securing your computer and learning how to identify and avoid suspicious links are the fundamentals of safe browsing habits.

Secure your computer

Limiting your computer’s vulnerability to malware is a crucial safe browsing habit.  Many malware programs take advantage of security flaws in Windows and other software. Keeping your OS, browser, and other programs updated is an important step in protecting your computer. The security patches in these updates make your computer immune to many threats.

Back up your files

Some malware can delete or corrupt data on your drives. Preparing for the possibility of data loss is much easier and cheaper than attempting to recover data after a malware attack. The two most common ways of doing this are copying your data to an external drive and using an online backup service, we have 5 TB of storage in our LMETB OneDrive Accounts.

Avoid suspicious links

Most malware requires you to click something to download and install it. These links are often disguised as something they are not. If you are aware of what suspicious links can look like, you can avoid them. Here are some examples of misleading links concealing malware downloads.

• Ads on websites can look like system messages or diagnostics warning you that something is wrong with your computer, like the image below.

  

• Ads can look like messages saying you have won a prize and instructing you to click to claim it.
• Pop-up windows frequently contain malware or attempt to lead you to a less secure site. Most reputable sites don’t use pop-up windows. Many browsers block pop-up windows by default.
• If you are prompted to download something you weren’t expecting—or if it seems to be unrelated to the page you were on—it’s probably malware.
• Headlines that are ambiguous and sensational that encourage you to click to read more are called clickbait. Sites that use lots of clickbait headlines are more likely to contain links to malware.

Identify suspicious sites

If you’re ever unsure whether a website or download is safe, close it and investigate the site before returning to it. It’s always a good idea to be cautious when browsing unfamiliar sites.

• Ask your friends if the site is reputable or if they have any experiences with the site.
• Search for information about the site. Use a search engine to find news about the organization that runs the site, or look for posts on forums about other people’s experiences with that site.
• Check the address bar in your browser. Some malicious websites are designed to look like other well-known sites, but your address bar will tell you which site you’re actually on. If you are no longer on the site you expected to be, it’s suspicious.