Email Safety C2R Portal
Caution when opening email is essential in todays Interconnected society. Resisting temptation when opening a tantilizing email is difficult at best. Not only can you introduce a harmful virus, it can also end up taking over your computer in ways you never imagined.
If you aren't to technically savy check out the Symantec video below for just a sampling of what malicious emails can do. Suffice it to say, if you can view your email in plain text (as opposed to what most people use - html) you will be better protected. Under no circumstances should you open an attachment from anyone that you do NOT know. And be suspicious of attachments in an email that contain a long list of recipients.
But what if your email gets hijacked? Meaning for some reason your email starts sending out all kinds of email without your knowledge or permision? This can be a nebulous process to rectify and professional IT help is usually required.
But here is where to start:
- Start by changing passwords to your email account.
- You might have to delete your address book (an unfortunate but sometimes necessary event). Take notes of important contacts if necessary so you can transfer them to your reset account.
- Contact your email provider or ISP so they do not "black list" you and ban your account from sending 'any' email.
- These attacks tend to be email provider specific, so do some googling to see if others have had similar issues and how did they resolve them.
- Good Antivirus can go a long long ways to helping prevent a "spammer" from taking over your machine.
Prevention
- Email account passwords NEED to be complicated, or difficult for others to guess!
- Keep your Antivirus software up to date and make sure that you do consistent "complete" scans - at least weekly.
- Limit your email access to computers or access points you have control over. Resist the temptation to log on to your email on someone elses computer! This means any internet cafe, friends computer, etc... Simply DO NOT do it!
- DO NOT open unsolicited email!
- Limit (as best you can) who gets your email. Some people set up a second account they use for "generic" internet purposes and a "real" account for emailing friends, family, et al. This way if your email gets hijacked through an unknown third party who has your email account in your "generic" email - the damage is somewhat mitigated.
- Lean towards an email service that encrypts your email from server to browser, like gmail or similar services.
Here are some good links and videos to follow up on!
For some quick facts on Email Scams click here.