Click, Click – Oops!

If you have ever been in the position of writing your first blog, you will know the term ‘overthinking’ all too well. Words don’t come easily for someone like me who has not put my writing skills into practice for many years, so for my first blog, I wanted to keep it simple and talk about something I think is important but equally relatable.

What’s my topic? Well, I thought I would touch on something that affects both our working and personal lives – dodgy emails!

All of us will have received some of these – and in my role as office administrator I see many of them. They are usually filtered through our ‘junk’ inboxes, and are easily recognised, or at least we would like to think they are. However, this is not always the case, as I recently discovered.

The usual giveaways are the ones that have ‘no subject’, ‘congratulations your refund has been processed’, or ones that pull at your heart strings, such as ‘regarding my child’ as the subject title. Depending on how your emails are viewed, the first few lines of the body can also provide further confirmation that the content is suspicious.

But what about when there is a more professional approach?

The subject may simply be ‘your invoice’, or ‘here is your statement’, and the company name, address and logo used for the signature are genuine according to an internet search of the company. The scammers have even gone to the lengths of including a photograph of the managing director or financial director for extra reassurance. I recently experienced this practice, but thankfully I was cautious enough to become suspicious and delete the email when I saw a ‘click to download’ link.

During my years of administrative work, I have become very familiar with the different types of cybercrime, including email phishing, and learnt how to recognise the dodgy ones.

However, there has been a big increase of cybercrime over the years, especially during the pandemic. I have heard of many companies that have fallen victim to internet-related crime, especially as the cybercriminals are constantly improving their ‘skills’ and finding new methods to catch us out. If we are to stay ahead of their tricks, we must remain vigilant and continue to improve our awareness of what is out there.

It only takes one inadvertent click to cause a whole lot of trouble!

To find out more about how Emma’s keeping us safe from the world of dodgy emails or how our team can help use PR and communications to maintain your online reputation contact us for a chat and a coffee – we would be delighted to tell you more.