The Yuma Police Department is warning area residents and winter visitors about the prevalence of phishing scams designed by thieves to lure victims into giving out personal information through convincing emails and web pages.
These messages usually try to get a potential victim’s attention by stating one or more of their accounts have been fraudulently accessed or that personal information needs to be updated for security purposes.
According to YPD, a potential victim receives an email from supposedly legitimate companies including banks, eBay, or PayPal. The notification contains a link or attachment to enter a web page on their site. The web page or site is “spoofed” to look legitimate but is not the real company’s site. Once a potential victim goes to the fake site, an ID and password are required.
After the victim has entered their ID and password the scammers have what they need to fraudulently access the real accounts at the legitimate websites.
To prevent these types of phishing attacks, YPD encourages individuals to check the spelling of all emails because scammers are often not located in the United States and their spelling may reflect their ineptitude with the English language. Signs to look for include capitalization and punctuation errors.
If an email contains a link to a website or an attachment, those are additional indicators the sender wants you to go to “their” site.
Recipients of such emails should contact the business that has supposedly sent the email to confirm they have indeed sent it. Legitimate businesses will not send emails requesting ID or password entry to update information.
Mark any questionable emails as spam and immediately delete them from your inbox and deleted files.
Never give personal information, ID numbers, passwords, or any other information to anyone sending emails.
If you have been the victim of this type of scam, you should report it online at www.ic3.gov providing as much information as possible. You may also file a police report with YPD by contacting them at 373-4700.