How To Spot a Phishing Email

Telltale signs to look for the next time an email that smells phishy arrives in your inbox.

1. Keep an eye out for misspellings, such as legitimate business names that are missing or off by just one or two letters. Additionally, an unexpected email from an address that you never communicated with before is a strong sign of a possible scam.

2. Subject lines containing too-good-to-be-true offers or threatening or alarming statements meant to elicit an emotional reaction are clues that someone’s trying to phish you.

3. Watch out for email sent to a lot of recipients or unexpected emails to email aliases (like the example below).

4. Any messages addressed generically--especially ones regarding financial transactions--are suspicious.

5. Extreme caution should be exercised with any link appearing in an unexpected or unsolicited email. Hover over the hyperlink text to see where the URL would actually direct you if you clicked. Scammers will also try to implant real business names in fake URL’s.

6. Phishing email text can contain a lot of drama--threatening legal action or telling you an unexpected package has arrived. Be on the lookout for demands to click, free offers, bad grammar or misspelled words.

7. In all circumstances, unexpected attachments should not be opened.

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The bullets above are good overall points to look for when scrutinizing a suspicious email, but they don’t cover all the ways in which scammers will attempt to phish you or other employees. That’s why it’s also vital to alert Tech Support by opening a ticket. We can’t know we’re being attacked without your help.

You can also report a phishing email in Outlook. There is a Report Message button in the upper right hand corner of your Message Ribbon. It’s a drop-down with choices like: Junk, Phishing, Not Junk…

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And in Gmail, you can report by clicking the three dots in the upper-right hand corner of your email, and then clicking Report phishing.

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If an email just feels off for any reason, that’s enough to be wary of it. A healthy dose of security awareness--with some skepticism and situational awareness thrown in--can go a long way. Err on the side of caution!

You are on the front lines when it comes to protecting us from scammers.

Thank you!