PayPal is a very reputable company who wouldn’t try to steal information from you. They possess one or several bits of your personal information, including card details, account details, personal information and possible information about your business.
What happens if they suddenly email you saying that your account has been stopped and you need to log in for further info – STOP!! This could be a scam.
Paypal are a world renown company, they would never try to steal your information. If you have e-Bay, you’ve probably heard of them. They are an electronic wallet which facilitates the movement of your money, without you having to give away your account information to any 3rd parties. They can take money out of your account via a card payment or via direct debit, they might even put money into your account following a collection or payment to you.
They would never get you to log into your account via an email and this is where problems start to arise. People see the logo and assume that the ‘PayPal’ email is legit – when it probably isn’t.
Scammers are finding increasingly different ways to manipulate the way we think and as such, they change the content of their emails to try and make you think that the email being portrayed s genuine.
They used to try the scare tactic – ‘Your account has been compromised’ ‘Your account has been hacked’, ‘We suspect there is fraud on your account’, ‘Your payment of £72.31 is being processed, if this isn’t you…’ – all of which will then follow with ‘Please log into your account’.
Another tactic being used is a nicer way, like the way in the video, ‘To make this email your primary email…’, ‘To ensure that the information we hold about you is correct…’, ‘We need to update our systems…’ which again all follow up with – ‘please log into your account’.
Moral of the story – if any email you receive involves you having log in to your account – please question the validity of it. Call the company directly and ask them to validate the email received. If you do call them DO NOT USE THE NUMBER IN THE EMAIL!
Things to watch out for:
- ‘Dear Moneyguy@moneyguy.com’ … has the email been addressed to you personally or has been addressed to your email address. If its not addressed to you personally – it’s potentially a scam.
- Does the content of your email make sense? – if you don’t have an account with Paypal (In this example) then it doesn’t make sense. If they are asking you to verify your email – when they emailed you … this doesn’t make sense. If they want you to update information… this doesn’t make sense, why would you need to update something if nothing has changed..? etc
- Is the grammar and spelling correct? A big tell tale sign of a scam is poor grammar or spelling. If the content doesn’t look professional – it probably isn’t.
- Click on the sender email. If its from an email address like Noreply@Paypal.com or Customerservice@Paypal.com – it could be legit – call using a reputable source and chase up. If its from noreply172945382@aey7hhych9u.co – it will be a scam.
- NEVER EVER EVER EVER Click on ANY Blue parts to an email. even if you just want to find out where it takes you. the website it takes you to could be a clone and/or just by clicking could give them permission to access to your laptop/mobile/computer/tablet.
- NEVER RESPOND – Don’t reply to the email. More often than not – by replying – although inherently there is no risk – what you have in fact done is confirmed that the email address is live and working.
If someone has access to your computer – they may have access to all manner of information such as your bank accounts, pin numbers, passwords to websites. Some scammers will be able to access cookies and various other parts of your history and computer which could compromise your security and inevitably all of your money or data or information.
Check out the video below and feel free to share so that no one else falls for the scam!
