I found this picture on Google pics and thought it wrapped up the concept of phishing perfectly.

Much similar to ransomware, through phishing the purpose of the criminal is to access your details in an attempt to gain access to your money.

I know that with the introduction of GDPR, and especially if you are based in Europe, you would have got rid of so many unwanted subscriptions to newsletters and updating emails.

Nevertheless, it is those very emails that look perfectly legit and which invite you to take action with a call-to-action button, which we must steer clear of. Because again, as we click on that button, we are redirected to a dodgy website which will introduce a virus in our device and will steal our personal information.

But, hold on, does this scenario remind you of anything at all?

Yes, call-to-action buttons are the very things that our Kyle encourages us to use in order to make our website more interactive and more involving for our visitors.

Likewise, we regularly invite our visitors to subscribe to our websites with pop-up windows, and then with the auto-responder of our choice, we send our subscribers exactly the same type of emails, which could sound not entirely trustworthy to our potential customers when they receive them.

Can you see where I am going with this?

Our subscribers could easily start doubting they are receiving unsafe emails from us!!!

The secret is in always check the authenticity of the sender's email. If you hover or click over the sender field, you will come up with the email address you received the email from. If you don't recognise it, or indeed if it looks dodgy, NEVER open that email!!!

Sometimes an email may look perfectly inoffensive. But as you open it, hidden codes in the email may start reading your activity on your device, from which websites you regularly access, to key recognition on your keyboard - which means your password could be easily detected over a period of time.

Likewise, in order to protect your customers and make your update emails trustworthy, make sure you send them from an account that is easily recognisable by your subscribers. This way they will rest assured that emails they receive from you are safe and can be opened and acted upon.

Now, unfortunately risks of cyber crime are not limited purely to ransomware and to phishing. Click on page 4, where I am going to talk to you about the risks associated with WI-FI HOTSPOTS.