Blog / You’re Busted!

That the government would graduate to Email delivery is an easy transition for most of us. And so this Email showed up in the inbox of one of our clients last week:

Subject: RE: Notification – 5644186-0872Cause: negligent driving

Violation No: 597338275
Date of infringement: 12/11/2016
Amount due: 116.00 CAN$ 
This documentation will be sent by mail to your address. However you can visualize it now, please click here. 

Camera Photo Proof
The fine shall be honoured within the statutory period of up to 26.11.2016. This is an automatically created message, please do not reply.

Notice the nice touch of spelling honoured the Canadian way. Of course, it’s bogus.  Clicking on the link takes you to healthlover.tv, a very unhealthy site that leads to malware and all sorts of problems. Fortunately, the user recognized it for what it was and did not act on it.

Another client got this one that posed as a Subpoena for a court action:

Subject: RE:RE: financial records subpoena
 
See you in court !!!
Thank you,
MICHAEL T. DIVER
T (405) 608-4990
F (405) 608-4991

Again, completely bogus.  I’ve never heard of a Subpoena for taking a rest. This one takes you to techsmart.vn, which is anything but smart. This was also deleted before any damage was done.

Most of us pride ourselves in thinking that we wouldn’t fall for such obvious scams.  But don’t be too sure.  I personally get close to 100 Emails on a busy day and the tendency is to be quick-to-click to act on a request or look for more information.  More than once, I’ve caught myself hovering over the hyperlink with my finger on the mouse button. Yikes!

Firewalls and Anti-Virus software is supposed to protect us from these pitfalls, and most do an excellent job.  But they’re not a guarantee of protection. The best and first defense is to pay attention – if something appears bogus, it most likely is. If you’re unsure, DO NOT ACT ON IT.  You can forward it on to your IT Manager or provider and they can check it out. Forwarding the Email does not activate the virus or malware.

And slow down – or one of these just might end up being legit.

Are any of our techs reading this?

Please contact us or your Primary Tech if you would like more information on how to protect your organization from malicious ransomware attacks.