Turn Your Bullshit
Detector Up To Eleven
The internet is a scary place. There are dangers lurking
everywhere. Everyone is permanently at risk from viruses, malware, trojans and
phishing attacks[1].
Your email account is a minefield. Whatever you do, don't open that attachment
if you don't recognise the source! Don't click on that link! Don't reply to
people you don't know!
And no matter how hard you try and protect yourself, what
can you do when the details you store online with other people, people you
trust, are stolen? In recent years we have seen the payment details from 40
million credit and debit card numbers stolen from US retailer Target, eBay had
customer details compromised in an attack that saw passwords and other data
stolen and Yahoo! have had customer data hacked so no matter how hard you try,
you are still at risk. Makes you want to unplug your router, drop off the grid
and go back to the more innocent days before the internet came along, doesn't
it?
Except that you aren't safe off the net either. Courier
fraud [2]
has been well publicised lately so perhaps you are now wise to that, although
there have been enough scary stories in the papers to make you want to stop
answering your telephone too. The thing about these sorts of scams is that they
evolve quickly, catching people unaware before the threat is publicised and
potential victims become too savvy to be caught. By then the fraudsters have
moved on to something else. Of course we all think that we are too street-wise
to be caught out, but the plain truth is we aren't, not all of the time anyway.
Sometimes no matter how astute we think we are, we get
caught off guard, I did a few years ago although thankfully nothing seemed to
come of it. It was in the days when broadband was relatively new. We had a
dial-up internet connection but were thinking of upgrading. One evening the
phone rang and the man at the other end said he was calling from BT and would
we be interested in having broadband installed? Yes, I replied and he took some
details including asking my date of birth, full address and mother's maiden
name by way of security checks. He told me to expect the router through the
post within a week with instructions on installation. A week or so elapsed and
nothing came, so I rang BT. They had no trace of any order for a router or
broadband at my address. I gave them the name of the chap who had phoned (work
habits die hard, I still always ask for caller's names) and they said that they
had no one of that name working at BT. I have no idea who phoned, why or what
they did with the information I gave them, but it has made me very cautious
when people ring and ask me security questions to prove who I am. After all if
someone phones purporting to be your bank and says that they have to identify
you by asking some security questions you could be revealing crucial
information to a fraudster for all you know. You could do what a former work
colleague of mine did and give an incorrect answer; if the caller doesn't
notice (as that particular caller didn't) then you know they are not who they
say they are.
There are 24 million daily users of Facebook in the UK, 206
million in Europe, 228 million in Asia and 152 million in North America. The
sheer size of Facebook and the incredible number of users make it potentially a
very dangerous place in many different ways. On a very basic level Facebook
users voluntarily make a whole lot of personal information about themselves
available to just about anyone who wants to see it, despite the site's security
settings, and that information can be useful to anyone with even the most
casual of malicious intentions.
Then there is the content. My wall, your wall, everyone's
wall is inhabited by links to this site, that site, sites you have subscribed
to, sites that your friends have shared, sites of whose provenance you have
absolutely no knowledge, yet we all merrily click on them. And some of them offer
us all sorts of fun, like the one that promises that you can hack your friends'
Facebook pages. Ok, so that is not a very nice thing to do, but it's between
friends, so what's the harm? Anyway, once you've done it you will tell your
friend and no damage done, eh? Not exactly, because what this alleged hack does
is grant the scammers access to your Facebook account.[3]
Now if you are a Facebook user (and given the numbers I
quoted above, the chances are that you are), you will have inevitably seen
posts, frequently shared by your friends, warning of scams, hoaxes and frauds
being perpetrated both on the internet and offline. Warnings about dodgy
emails, dodgy phone calls and the activities of fraudsters and crooks out there
in the "real world." Like the warning that key rings are being given
out at petrol stations and contain a tracking device enabling crooks to track
you to your home or where your car is parked and rob you or steal your vehicle.
Setting aside for a moment the huge cost involved in the supposed crooks
setting up such a scheme when they could simply follow their victims or pick
people at random, this warning has been going about for years, since 2008 in
fact and appears to have started after a petrol retailer in South Africa began
giving out genuine promotional key rings. The hoax has been debunked numerous
times in the last six years, but continues to circulate. Similarly the story
that regularly surfaces and gets posted on Facebook etc, suggests that cars are
being stolen by carjackers who stick a piece of paper over your rear window
obscuring your view, making you leave your car with the engine running to
remove it, whereupon they hop in and drive your car away. This has been doing
the rounds for nearly ten years and while it is both plausible and potentially
possible that this could happen, there are no recorded cases of it happening
anywhere.
 |
| Emails suggesting that System32 was a virus on your computer and needed to be uninstalled is another malicious prank that has been doing the rounds for many years. |
You may have seen posts inviting you to "Like"
something and maybe post a comment to win a prize. The most common of the prize
scams seems to involve Tesco vouchers. Share the offer of a free Tesco voucher,
post a comment ("Thank you Tesco") and you may win a £75
voucher...except you won't because this "offer" has nothing to do
with Tesco. What you will do however is be asked to complete a survey,
questions in which will include your name, address, phone numbers etc. Your
details will be harvested by scammers who will earn commission and you will be
inundated with all sorts of unwanted promotional emails, phone calls, text
messages and junk mail.
 |
| You have probably seen these Facebook posts offering the chance to win Tesco vouchers, which have nothing to do with the supermarket at all. |
It's fair enough that people will pass on what appear to be
genuine warnings or offers to their friends; they do so in good faith, but
whenever I see one I Google the content. Nine times out of ten it takes me to http://www.hoax-slayer.com.
That isn't to say everything is a hoax. I saw one I was suspicious of about a
pay at the pump petrol station where the machine had been rigged to steal debit
and credit card details. When I Googled that one it proved to be true.
Staying safe online, not falling for hoaxes and tricks, is a
constant war in which vigilance is essential. I suggest that you invest in some
decent anti-virus software and pop down to Maplin or Radio Shack and buy the
biggest, best and most expensive bullshit detector that they stock.
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