PHISH AND GINGERBREAD

I very nearly fell for a phishing scam today. It was close: I got an email from PayPal saying that failbook (of all things) had charged me £48.71.

Obviously that's ridiculous so I clicked through the links and then stopped to think when it started asking me for all my personal details.

Erm...no.

This kind of thing is awful isn't it? I bet, right now, more-vulnerable people are entering their bank details into websites out of panic that someone's fraudulently tried to scam them - only to be scammed in their effort to avoid a scam. It makes me feel a bit sick, that kind of thing - like watching videos of smooth-oiled sales people in pensioners' homes with a winning smile and a portfolio full of nothing, ready to steal those poor people's hard-earned central-heating money. What's wrong with the world?

So...

Always, always, always check the URL. Make sure that it matches the URL for the real site and doesn't have any unusual characters in it. Never panic, don't enter anything into an HTTPS site without a padlock symbol next to it, and be suspicious of anything that addresses you as 'user' or 'customer' or #1389045j

-

In similar fashion, I did actually fall for another scam earlier: I drank a Twinings Gingerbread Green tea.

I'd forgotten that flavoured infusions annoy me by being a thousand times weaker than they smell. But there were free samples in the kitchen, so the old nose-for-a-bargain kicked in.

The old nose-for-a-bargain also thought it would be in for that full rich taste of gingerbread, as promised by the potent aroma steaming from the mug, and the words printed on the promotional material.

It was tea with a hint of ginger - as though someone had wafted a stem of the stuff over the teabag in the factory.

I checked the box afterwards:

"Gingerbread green tea," it said, "will remind you of your favourite cake shop."

Yes, and then laugh in your face when all the cakes turn out to be made of plasticine and plastic.

Don't fall for it people. Stick to the real stuff and don't let yourselves be scammed.

Now, if you'll excuse me I have a Nigerian Ambassador emailing me with a rather lucrative proposal involving a foreign bank account...