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No, SARS doesn’t really want to give you a refund and other phishing tales

Wednesday, February 6th, 2013

Every year we send out literally dozens of warning e-mails, and continue to do so, because despite the frequent warnings, people  still get caught falling for these tricks. 

Take note of the following scam from fraudsters claiming to be from SARS.
 
Emails are going out to university (and private addresses) seemingly coming from “SARS” informing them that they have a refund waiting for them.  (Wow! a tax refund) Clicking on the hyperlink in the email takes you to a fake “e-filing” site that has hyperlinks for the four big South African banks and instructions to log on to your Internet banking site for “confirmation of your details”.  When you follow the Nedbank link (as an example), you are taken to a copy of the Nedbank internet banking site that asks for profile, pin and password.  Supplying these takes you to a second page that asks you for your mobile number.  Submitting information on this page takes you to a page that requests the reference number sent to your cellphone.
 
Do not authorise any cellphone message that comes through if you end up in the above situation.  Furthermore, do not click on any hyperlinks in emails or divulge your account or mobile number details to anyone over the phone or via email.  Banks will never ask you to access internet banking through a link in an email, neither will banks ever ask for your mobile number when you access internet banking.

Another particulary sneaky phishing attack surfaced today. 

It comes from “Linda Perez” and has a subject line of “Administrator (Sorry for the inconvenience)” 

It asks you to contact the “sender” with your username and password so they can “expand your mailbox manually” 

Of course this is a phishing attack, and you should never respond to such mails. 

Do not respond, flag the sender as Junk Mail and delete the message.

ARTICLE BY DAVID WILES

(Afrikaans) Nuwe e-pos “malware” veroorsaak verwarring op kampus

Tuesday, January 15th, 2013

Sommige gebruikers ontvang sedert gister `n e-pos wat aandui dat jou e-pos posbus sy limiet bereik het en waarsku dat jou toegang tot sy e-pos afgesny gaan word indien dit nie onmiddellik geaktiveer word deur op `n skakel te kliek nie. Soos met alle ander weergawes van hierdie tipe “malware” e-posse, moet onder geen omstandighede op die skakel kliek nie. As jy met die muis oor die skakel beweeg, sal dit `n onbekende adres wys wat nie verband hou met die e-pos se onderwerp nie. In sommige gevalle sal dit voorkom of die e-pos deur iemand gestuur is wat jy ken, maar onthou dat die “malware” `n gebruiker se posbus infiltreer en aan sy kontakte gestuur kan word. Onder is `n voorbeeld van so `n e-pos.


From: Abrahams, B, Mnr <…..@sun.ac.za> Sent: 14 January 2013 19:51 Subject: Your Mailbox Has It Storage Limit Your Mailbox Has Exceeded It Storage Limit As Set By Your Administrator, And You Will Not Be Able To Receive New Mails Until You Re-Validate It. To Re-Validate – >Click Here: Thanks, System Administrator.

Scam: Cancellation Of Debit Order (Absa)

Monday, October 29th, 2012

Please note the following phishing scam: These scams are becoming far more fine-tuned to South African victims and especially university accounts. Earlier this month there was a specific scam using Alexander-Forbes as a means to attack, Alexander-Forbes being the university’s preferred consultant for insurance, medical aid consultancy etc. Barely a week later Virgin Active’s name was used to attempt to scam university personnel. This week it is the turn of Outsurance. The e-mails are virtually identical, only the names and the servers in the background change, but you should be able to see that they are homing more and more to South African users, which tells me one thing that either they are getting this information from South African victims or these scamming operations are South-African based.   Here is an expurgated version of the scam. Please take note and be very careful!  From: Absa [mailto:ibt@onlinedata.co.za] Sent: 29 October 2012 01:46 PM To: Name <university_email@address.goes.here> Subject: Cancellation Of Debit Order(Absa) Dear Customer, We received a Debit Order alert on your account this morning from Outsurance Insurance Company to deduct the sum of R3150.00 from your account. If you don’t want to authorized this Debit Order you can cancel by following the instruction below. Click below to Cancel the Debit Order on your profile. You will receive a message on your cellphone with a link, type in the last Eight digit RVN on the SMS message to complete the cancellation. click here to Cancel. . Regards, Security Department

(INFORMATION SUPPLIED BY DAVID WILES)

Warning: New SARS, ABSA & eBucks phishing email

Tuesday, September 18th, 2012

If you receive an email claiming to be from ABSA regarding a payment from SARS or eBucks (see examples below), do not open it or click on any of the links. These are phishing emails attempting to acquire your passwords and other information. Immediately delete these emails and do not reply to them.


From: Absa Bank [mailto:lis@absa.co.z]
Sent: 18 September 2012 08:29 AM
To: …
Subject: SARS E-filing Payment Received

Dear Client,

A payment has been made into your account from SARS e-filing
In other to process and confirm this payment please do click here to login.
During this process, your RVN will be checked and verified.

Regards,


 

From: Absa Internet Banking [mailto:payment@absa.co.za]
Sent: 19 September 2012 15:01
To:
Subject: Payment Made To Your Online Banking!!

Absa Bank


Online Payment Made

Dear Customer,

A payment has been made to your account. To view the details of the payment, please click here to login. and enter the RVN that will be sent to your cellphone. please contact our support centreon 0860 123 000 . If you are calling from outside South Africa, call +27 11 299 4701 .

Our consultants are available between 8am and 9pm on weekdays, and 8am and 4pm on weekends and public holidays. 

The Internet banking Team

Moving Forward

Copyright Absa. All rights reserved.
Absa of South Africa Limited (Reg. No. 1962/000738/06). Authorised financial services provider. Registered credit provider (NCRCP15).

Disclaimer and confidentiality note:
Everything in this email and any attachments relating to the official business of Absa Group Limited is proprietary to the group.
It is confidential, legally privileged and protected by law. Absa does not own and endorse any other content.
The person addressed in the email is the sole authorised recipient.
Please notify the sender immediately if it has unintentionally reached you and do not read disclose or use the content in any way.

Absa cannot assume that the integrity of this communication has been maintained nor that it is free of errors, virus, interception or interference.
For our privacy policy or information about the Absa group visit our website at www.absa.co.za.

Absa email disclaimer and confidentiality note

Please go to http://www.absabank.co.za/ site/homepage/emaildisclaimer. html to read our email disclaimer and confidentiality note. Kindly email disclaimer@absabank.co.za (no content or subject line necessary) if you cannot view that page and we will email our email disclaimer and confidentiality note to you.


From: eBucks Credit [mailto:credit@ebucks.com]
Sent: 25 September 2012 11:56 AM
To:
Subject: eBucks Reward: You have earned a eBucks points !!!

Alert

We have detected unusual activity on this account and for your security are temporarily blocking access. To regain access to this account, please click here.

If you are unable to login, contact Member Services at 1-877-786-0722 for further assistance.

Spam – not just processed meat

Friday, September 14th, 2012

Spam, or junk mail is defined as identical, disruptive e-emails sent to a large amount of e-mail or cellphone users.  When a receiver clicks on one of the links in the message, he/she is diverted to a phishing website or websites containing malware.  Spam e-mails can also contain hidden malware scripts. The opposite of spam is, believe it or not, ham. In other words e-mails you WANT to receive.

The origin of the meaning of spam in this context, can be laid at the feet of the obscure British comedians known as Monty Python. In a 1970 sketch a group of Vikings in a restaurant starts chanting the word “spam” so incessantly that no-one else can have a conversation. Click here if you’d like to see the original Monty Python sketch where the word “spam” is mentioned 132 keer times in a mere three and a half minutes.

Even Google is amused by die word. The company once hid a surprise in their gmail users’ spam folder. When you clicked on your Spam folder, a webclip containing a variety of recipes for the original variety of spam. Amongst others recipes for  “Spam Primavera”, “Spam Swiss Pie”, “Creamy Spam Broccoli Casserole” and “Spam Veggie Pita Pockets”. The first spam was sent on 3 May 1978 to advertise a new computer system. It was sent to 600 ARPANET users and all 600 names were typed in by hand from a printed document. You can read the original e-mail here.

It is estimated that, from August 2010, 200 billion spam messages are sent per day. Lucky for Stellenbosch campus users, we have a fairly strict spam filer and huge amounts of spam bypass your inbox every day. If you still receive unnecessary spam, there are ways to decrease it even more. If it makes you feel any better though – according to Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO, Bill Gates receives four million e-mails a year and most of it’s spam.

SOURCES: http://blog.emailaddressmanager.comhttp://mashable.com & www.wikipedia.org

 

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