II. How Can We Avoid Phishing?
By Practicing Safe Email Habits
•If you receive an email from your bank for anything besides routine updates, quarantine the email and contact them directly.
•If you receive an email in your work account that looks suspicious (or a message to your organization via social media accounts), alert your IT team or manager immediately.
•If necessary, email an alert to your co-workers as well if they’re also addressed in the email. Your organization may be experiencing a spearphishing attack that can affect the entire organization.
•Double-checking with a contact if they appear to have sent you an attachment you weren’t expecting.
By Practicing Safe Web Browsing, Social Media and Chatting Habits
Be very suspicious of private messages on social networking sites or IM which prompt you to:
•Click on links of “pictures of you” that don’t exist or look suspicious.
•Download a tool or piece of software that looks appealing.
•Download games that looks harmless.
•Ask you to provide any type of sensitive information.
By Always Examining URL links
On websites, social networking sites, and IM (as well as in emails). Sometimes this may be the only way to realize you’ve been redirected to a (sometimes very convincing) login page.
By Always Checking the URL
When you’re unexpectedly directed to a login screen, or if you’re redirected to an unfamiliar “warning” page of any kind for a service that you use.
By Staying Alert for Phishing Attacks
Which are becoming far more effective and harder to recognize – examples to share include this fake Google login page and this fake Apple Store ID reset page.
•Approaching links shared over social networking sites with extreme caution, especially if they’re posted by unknown people.
•Avoiding any advertisements that appear to be scams.
•Similar to avoiding phishing attacks in email, hover over URLs and hyperlinks to check where they lead.
•Examine links from URL shorteners like bit.ly before clicking on them: Copy them into the browser and adding a ”+” at the end of the URL.
•If you’re unsure about a URL, check it at VirusTotal.
Step 4: Closing Exercise
Go through each list and identify each type of exposure to malware and each solution to malware as either technical or non-technical. Use this to illustrate how being safe Online is a combination of technical and behavioral solutions