Jude’s Eclectic Resources

I always do my banking online and now I also get my statement online. It saves the trees and it keeps crooks from getting my information. I don’t think I have been inside my bank for 4 years and it’s been that long since I have written a check also. I always use my bank card so convenient, but as with any type of business there is always someone sitting around trying to figure out how to perpetrate a fraud. There are some preventive measures you can take however to keep from becoming a victim.

There are fake bank sites set up to look like the regular site of your bank so be very careful. I have already ran into this when I didn’t put the right url in and if your distracted and not paying attention you can put your username and password in before you realize that isn’t your secure site. Thank goodness my banking site asks me a question when I haven’t been on for a couple of days. So be very careful that you are typing in the correct url, usually they try to make them simple, but sometimes I still mess up, but when it comes to my money I now keep an alert eye out.

We all know what phishing is, hopefully everyone has seen it with the fake paypal and eBay sites, but they also have the bank phishing emails being sent out now. You might open an email and find a request for information from “your bank.” A link will be provided for you, never ever click on that link. If you click on the link and go to the fake bank site, you might give up all kinds of valuable information if you do not pay attention to what is happening. You could be asked not only your specific internet banking information. You could also be asked for other private data like your social security number, or your driver’s license number.

Remember that a legitimate internet banking operation will never ask for the password for your account, same as paypal and you should never give it to anyone even if they claim to be from the bank.Your bank will never ask for personal information through an email link either. Anytime you deal with the bank online, type in the bank’s name yourself. Then look to be sure the closed lock symbol appears on the upper right corner of your screen. You will never go to your internet banking website without being able to see that locked padlock symbol.

The best defense is to watch your account carefully which I always do. Make sure you always know what money is going in and out of your account that way you will notice if something unexpected is happening. If you see withdrawals on your account that you did not make, be sure to report it to your bank straight away. Internet banking frauds are often hard to find. If you don’t act quickly, you make it nearly impossible.

Once you have reported it you can make arrangements to put your money in a new secure account.This way the crooks will be able to steal less money from your account and you will not be vulnerable to further attacks.The bank has many procedures to safeguard the security of your internet banking. However, it will be much better if you take some steps to protect yourself as well. We always think these things happen to the other guy, but just remember you are the other guy.

Every time we turn around there is more and more spam and because there’s so many kinds of it, it’s a challenge to find the right organization or site to report it to. Each type of spam violates the law in one way or another and each can be prosecuted if it can be proven.

Saving and sending the entire email header is an important step in reporting spam. The header of every email you receive will contain information on the full chain of computers through which the email passed in order to get to you.

Generally, most email will pass through at least four computers: The spammer’s computer, the spammer’s ISP, your ISP and finally your computer. This is the most reliable way for an anti-spam service to track down the spammer’s ISP because the spammer will camouflage the “from” address.

As the email passes through each computer, information is added to the header indicating who the mail came from, as well as where they are sending it. While this header information will seem complicated, you just need to make note of the originating ISP, which will be easy to recognize. For example, if you receive your mail through AOL and you note “yahoo” in the string of information, then you will know to report the spam to yahoo.

To read the information in the email header, just right click on the email, choose properties and then either “options” or “header” depending on your email program. Then cut and paste the header path in its entirety, into the body of the email. Finally, forward the spam email first, to the spammer’s ISP, and then next to spam reporting agencies

You should also forward the spam to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). You can do this at the website: uce@ftc.gov. While the FTC will not take action on individual incidents, they will add the spam to a database reffered to as UCE (unsolicited commercial email)

A common spam scam you may come across is called a “419 Scam”, or the Nigerian Advance Fee Fraud. These spam emails generally relates a tale of woe - a death in the family and a huge inheritance that the sender needs your (financial) help to claim. As improbable as it sounds, many people have fallen for this scam and millions of dollars have been defrauded from them. Fax a copy of this spam along with the header information to the United States Secret Service.

Here is a list of the agencies you may report spam to, along with the type of email they can handle or will deal with.

• The Federal Trade Commission (FTC)

www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/edcams/spam/ - This site offers you information about the law enforcement actions that have been taken against deceptive mailers and companies and those who do not honor opt-out requests from email recipients..

• www.spamabuse.org

This is a third party reporting agency.

• www.spamcop.net

Another third party agency which will report spam on your behalf to the relevant anti-spam agency.

For stock fraud, email the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) at enforcement@sec.gov . They are prosecuting however they are only able to deal with fraud in email that has to do with stocks and bonds.

So now you have a few places you can report spam to if it bothers you and gets overwhelming. I use to report it, but now I just go with the flow and delete it.